Ispindel Battery Life

[Zom]

G'day,
Bought an Ispindel but having trouble with battery life. Doesn't seem to last more than 3 days.
I have it set at 900 sec but even tried 3600 sec in one brew and still only lasted 3 days.
Theres a green light on all the time but i believe thats normal.
Firmware i s 6.0 ??
Blue light flicks on when sending every 15 minutes.
I even bought a new 3500mAh battery but still drains way too quick.
Any help at all would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Mark

 

[RoomWithABrew]

Firmware I think is now at 7+
Have a look at this thread
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/ispindle-diy-electronic-hydrometer.598187/page-47
I have some comments and pictures as to why one of my ispindels had terrible battery life.

 

[ppsmith]

Theres a green light on all the time but i believe thats normal.

I’m not sure it is - that could well be the cause of it.

If I was gonna take a punt I’d guess that green led might be on the accelerometer board? If so there’s a note to remove the resistor that’s associated with it in the iSpindel documentation, but it’s not super clear and easy to miss.

Looks like I removed the LED rather than the resistor on mine, but the end result is the same. Killing that will remove the constant current draw that seems to be draining your battery

 

[SMP Brewery]

Mines been in the fermentor since the 26th June @ 900 Secs but I do use a relay. So that’s 16 days and still working currently @ 3.6 started at 4.2

 

[RoomWithABrew]

I've got two still sending, one in fermenter since 10th April and the other since 24th April.
Signal strength for wifi does affect battery life, they get an -75db signal strength to the WiFi relay.
Signal every 1200seconds.
Battery now at 3.69V. So only a few weeks more life.

 

[RoomWithABrew]

Firmware I think is now at 7+
Have a look at this thread
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/ispindle-diy-electronic-hydrometer.598187/page-47
I have some comments and pictures as to why one of my ispindels had terrible battery life.

 

[gingerneil]

Where did you get it, and what control board is it using? The clone wemos boards can have huge battery drain due to deep sleep issues. You really want a genuine Lolin D1 board.

 

[Rogerh]

I have an Ispindel from Neil and the battery life is good. Just finished a 15 day ferment and it went from 4.24 down to 4.0 in that time. Mind you I only have it reporting once an hour so that probably helps.

 

[Agentgonzo]

@gingerneil , does it matter if the battery goes totally flat with the batteries you've used? Mine is about to run out of juice after a bit over 2 weeks (need to increase it from reporting every 30 minutes). I know that's true of some batteries that you don't want to let them completely discharge, but no idea about these

 

[gingerneil]

@gingerneil , does it matter if the battery goes totally flat with the batteries you've used? Mine is about to run out of juice after a bit over 2 weeks (need to increase it from reporting every 30 minutes). I know that's true of some batteries that you don't want to let them completely discharge, but no idea about these

Hi
There is battery protection built into my ispindels. The device will shut down and not power on when the voltage drops to 3.3v. This protects it from fully discharging and causing issues. I would advice to recharge it when you have finished a brew though - to keep it above this low level if its going to be stored and unused for a while.
(shout up via message if anyone wants one.. :) )

 

[Agentgonzo]

Hi
There is battery protection built into my ispindels. The device will shut down and not power on when the voltage drops to 3.3v. This protects it from fully discharging and causing issues. I would advice to recharge it when you have finished a brew though - to keep it above this low level if its going to be stored and unused for a while.
(shout up via message if anyone wants one.. :) )

Thanks. Though the last reported voltage was 2.8V.

I'll recharge it once it comes out of the fermenter, but I'll leave it in until then (probably the weekend).

Just out of interest, how much is a new battery ?

 

[The Baron]

Got mine from Neil and the battery will drop from 4.2 to 3.9 ish over 2 brews so good battery life

 

[gingerneil]

Thanks. Though the last reported voltage was 2.8V.

I'll recharge it once it comes out of the fermenter, but I'll leave it in until then (probably the weekend).

Just out of interest, how much is a new battery ?

You sometimes get the odd spurious reading as it dies.
I don't sell the batteries by themselves. You can buy them at a few decent and trustworthy online shops - fogstar is where I get mine. Be very careful buying off amazon etc as there are loads of dodgy batteries around. You also need to d careful to buy the correct weight, and you'll likely need to recalibrate.

 

[RoomWithABrew]

I have one of my ispindels (open source distilling board self built ispindel software) in a wine reporting twice an hour since 6th November 2022. Battery is currently 3.74V.
This seems exceptional especially as the battery was from a previous device.
Others last a few weeks or get recharged at the end so don't get the marathon test.
Recently I've changed to gravitymon on some units as it's more flexible with great support, power management seems better.

 

[Agentgonzo]

Wow. I used to get a few weeks out of a battery before is discharged.

I do have stainless steel fermenters though, and this last brew was in the garage so even further from the WiFi point.

Here is the graph of battery and signal strength (which was down at 80-90db for some of the time which I imagine affects the battery).

I was led to believe that a fully enclosed metal cage would be a Faraday cage and block all radio waves, so the fact that it works over wi-fi is a triumph in itself, and a failing of my physics knowledge

 

[RoomWithABrew]

@Agentgonzo
No doubt that the signal strength does make a difference.

If you buy a D1 mini and pick up an old router ( the ones with aerials sticking out), you can make a wifi repeater which will really help with reliability and battery longevity.
https://www.instructables.com/External-Antenna-for-ESP8266/
https://github.com/martin-ger/esp_wifi_repeater

 

[gingerneil]

I also to the nautilis wifi relay and display for the ispindels.. Bridges wifi to your chosen app, and also shows the ispindel data on a cool little full colour display.

 

[Tom.]

It’s the Nautilus firmware available somewhere? I’m pretty sure I’ve got all the hardware. Just looking to make a one-off.

 

[gingerneil]

Its not public and isnt an open source license in the same way that the ispindel firmware is.
Details are on the Nautilis Smart Systems – Smart electronics, sensors and devices in the home and home brewing website - you could try contacting the developer?

 

[Tom.]

Fab, thank you.