I think the comments you make are good. I do have a question about the removing the regulator. I assume you mean the 5V to 3.3V regulator.
I connect to the 5V and I see lot of variation in moisture readings due to the variation in the output of the power supply (solar panel/stepdown). I have a calibration routine for that. The voltage can go as high as 4.2V, which I believe may be bad if I connect the power supply to 3.3V.
Of course, this is not a concern if using two 1.5V batteries. With batteries, the moisture reading would be more consistent over a day. Lot of advantages there. I just don't like changing batteries and I really hate it when they leak. I have every reason to believe that my power supply will last 10 years and I am fortunate to live in a place with consistent sunshine . Someone replicating my project will have to take this into consideration. My design easily accommodates a different power supply.
And my power supply could be used in other projects.
Resistive vs Capacitive sensor. I'm glad you report good results. This gives people options.
Water moisture: I've had good experience with "spraying" the Arduino with clear electronic coating and sealing the enclosure with liquid tape.
-OSD
@fsgraz Did some testing Today and my RFM range is over 80 meters node to node, with no long range antenna. That will be my next test, just waiting for a shipment from China to arrive. I did how ever notice an extreme improvement when I connected the gateway through a USB hub and then started to dig through the forum. @AWI once wrote about using an external PSU to power the long range NRF PA/LAN. I'll try that this weekend as connecting it to they USB port of my PI extended the range to 20 meters Node to Node.
@nagelc said in New Setup for Home Environment Monitoring – Using NRF24L01+, Arduino Pro Mini, and BME280:
bme280
I read somewhere that the temperature sensor on the BME280 is sort of an afterthought. I did a few experiments comparing them to the DHT11/12/22 and found them only a little better. (Take this with a grain of salt, maybe you'll want to do you're own experiments.) I did do a lot of experiments with the DHT's and they really suck. +/-2°C Which turns out to mean +/-2°C offset (component variation) and +/-2°C measurement: +/-4°C from what the temperature actually is. My experience, yours may be better.
Please post your experience with OTA. I haven't tried it on Arduino's but it's awesome on ESP8266. I hesitate with Arduino's because I had some erratic behaviour running Arduino's when pushing the memory limit.
I, too, use the MQTT data transport to Home Assistant (HA) and I find that excellent. Getting data from HA is a bit tricky, but do-able. I have a flow meter and use HA to store the last read; meaning, if there is a power failure, HA sends the last read on Arduino boot. I don't use the EEPROM because that has a spec of 100,000 writes which the meter would do in about a year, thus, necessitating a new Arduino.
I truly appreciate you sharing. Thanks!
-OSD
@OldSurferDude
yeah, 10 virgin nodes powered up at the same time is a bad idea I seem to remember reading somwewhere here warning aginst that.
If yu have node ID trust issues with Mysensors you should move your address to different locaion as 0x00 is used by Mysensors... just sayin..;)
