Checking the runtime of a Heltec LoRa V3 running Meshtastic powered by a 4000mAh lithium battery
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- Опубликовано: 24 июл 2024
- In this video I run a Heltec WiFi LoRa V3 board running Meshtastic from a 4000mAh battery originally from a powerbank that met an untimely end a few years ago (the battery survived surprisingly hence why it is being used here), I check how long the unit runs off this particular battery, and it seems to have a decent runtime.
I left the unit on my bedside table because it is close to a convenient mobile phone charger to charge the battery up, after the test was done I recharged the battery overnight and disconnected everything and placed the unit back in the box it came in until after my trip stateside in a couple of weeks.
#meshtastic #lora #868MHz #electronics #battery
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I ran mine on a 10,000 mAh battery earlier this week. The display on the battery showed about 57% after about 27 hours so that sounds broadly in line with your results. Even without solar charging that would probably be enough for an 'away day' somewhere, although it would presumably eat more battery if it was functioning as a node as it would be transmitting more. Useful video!
Got a similar setup. Planning to stick it in the attic with a charger on a smart outlet, duty cycle the charger for (guessing) 2 hours per day, so the battery should be topped up all the time. Emergency comms on a budget.
I wish we had cheaper nrf52840 boards with lora, those are significantly more energy efficient than the ESP32s
My Lilygo T-Beam using a 3000mAh 18650 battery lasts just shy of 24h hours, so a bit power hungery.
Just plonked up a 4.6dBi colinear at 8m above the house running off USB and can cover most of the Tees valley 24/7.
Have 'seen' loads of nodes but most seem to switch off after a short period of usage.
I thought the idea of a mesh was to keep things live so that reliable comms can be maintained ?
You're much better off with an NRF based radio if you're trying to run it off solar+battery, they are much lower power requirements than the ESP32 based radios. T-Echo from Lilygo is a good choice.
Hi Siftah!
23 days with an 3200mah battery.... I LOVE MY RAK 😊
What settings did you have on the V3?
Was it spending battery on wifi or Bluetooth?
How busy was your mesh in terms of messages?
I had a 4000mAh on power save mode and it lasted 84Hrs
Just curious, great video
Can't recall what the settings are right now and I am away in the United States so can't check right now how it was set up, also the battery was a used one originally from another device which may contribute to lack of runtime.
I will be picking up the Meshtastic stuff once I return to the UK
Thumbs up
What chargers can one use for these various LoRa batteries?
On that device battery charging is done via the USB-C socket while the battery is connected to it, this is usually the safest way to charge them
I've had mine running all day at work straight off USB. Not made a single contact. Does anyone know if I have to set a public channel or is it the standard LongFast standard 🤔
If you turn on MQTT and connect it to the internet a lot comes through but it could overload the device and cause it to exceed duty cycle limits
@@PaulMcGeeM0WNUPaul thank you I appreciate that. I noticed in the Meshtastic Android there was a PTT swith. I need to learn a bit more. However only got my unit yesterday.
@@TRIPPLEJAY00 If it's any consolation .. I didn't see anything for awhile either. Took the device to work and it did see a bunch of channels there. Then, by the weirdest coincidence, the local hams put up a LoRa repeater south of town, now there's plenty of signal. Build it and they will come :)
I have a power bank with a 5V output, would that be ok to power this?
I see no reason why not
It draws very little current so the powerbank may switch off. There are videos on RUclips showing various ways around this issue.
The Heltec V3 is great as a home node, but not as a battery powered unit when nRF52 units are available.
I will look at the nRF52 type devices at some point in the future
Everyone says this, and couldn't be further from the truth.... Unless you live in US, everywhere else is a P.I.T.A to order. Raks site doesn't always have stock, and not always available to ship 🤷
@@jamess1787 What you've just posted couldn't be further from the truth. I'm not in the US, ordering is simple from RAK direct, they are rarely out of stock, they have stock now, and they are also all over AliExpress too. Try harder.
Doesn't your DMM use some juice from that battery?
In my experience I have not known DMMs to draw any significant amount when measuring voltage
Oh my god so so much personal detail irrelevant to the video, lol. This reminds me of trying to have a conversation with my wife where she’s trying to tell me a story and there’s all these tangents that are relevant to the story. Bit of advice, stabilize the camera. Just received a pair of these version 3 boards from Heltec, one on 5000 mah battery, and the other one running on a 20,000 mah battery bank. The 5000 one is probably closer to 3800 in real world, and that seems to last running it for about 20 hours. That's with no Wi-Fi, only Bluetooth connected to my phone, with no deep sleep mode. My area doesn't seem to be very meshtastic, so I'm sure I need to get a slightly bigger battery bank or battery if I want to use it outside and connected to solar
What are the specs of the battery?
Other than 3.7V 4000mAh I don't really know, it came out of an old power bank that had failed
Helltec V3 4-5 days on 3 cells 18650.
This video should be 5 seconds long. I skipped some 10 points but had no lock catching how long the thing worked.
Can somebody just write the number?
See 8:58