Soil Sensor readings are not working properly

Troubleshooting
41

hi @roryaronson, I even leave the soil sensor in the same location without moving it. Then I read the sensor every 5 secs and I get the full range of values between 200 and 1020 up and down and up again,
So for me, I dont get any useful values from the sensor.

Is there some update ere in V1.5?

42

Our Genesis v1.5 kits include a custom soil sensor PCB that measures soil moisture in the same way as the SparkFun ones used before. The new PCB also has a temperature sensor which can be read over I2C, though we don’t have firmware support for it yet.

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43

Hi @JoeHou, @qurzschluss
I followed your thread and installed the farmware “Set Pin IO Mode”. I did a sequence that sets the pin 59 to Input:0.
But still my values are always very similar, between 890 and 905, independently if in air or in water…
I use a capactive sensor like you do, and I am not a sklĂ­lled hardware guy (more software :slight_smile:), could you give me some hints what I can do to find out if and how i get my capacitive soil sensor working properly?
Thanks in advance
Markus

44

Good luck!!

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45

Thanks,
today I tested the capacitive sensor with a multi meter.

It returns back on the analog output:
Dry: 3.3 - 3.4 V
Humid: 2.4 -2.5 V
Water: 1.5 V

Shouldn’t that be ok to differentiate wet, humid, dry ?

This is my device:

grafik
grafik1839×968 427 KB

46

Just remember that you can’t use the whole resolution of 0V-5V (0-1023) of your input pins as these capacitive sensors output is officially only 0-3V. Measuring completely dry soil (3V- 3.3V) should get you values from 613 to 675 while measuring in water (1,5V) should be like 306.

47

I gave it another try last weekend and it was a combination of 2 things:

  1. I need to set IO mode to “input (0)” on pin 59 (there is a farmware that is described in the post above)
  2. I fixed my connectivity problems between UTM and tools by using some lubrication

Now the sensor seems to work quite reliable.
I could measure around 680 for very dry soil or air, 480-580 for wet soil, and around 400 for water…

Works now :slight_smile: :+1:

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