I want to connect ping sonar 180 to a 50 meter cable with the grove RS485 module and then recover the data by Arduino and send it via wireless to an Arduino connected via USB port to my PC on which I wish to receive the data with the ping viewer software. I first started by connecting the sonar directly to the Arduino connected to my PC with the Grove rs485 module (a wired connection) but unfortunately I cannot receive data on ping viewer. Need help . THANKS
Hi Traoré, welcome to the BR forums!
Sounds like you’re working on a cool project. Are you using a ping2 sonar or a ping360?
If you’re using the ping/ping2 single-beam sonar, you’ll need to use a converter to change the serial output to RS485 for your long range connection. Using a telemetry radio, typically ~415Mhz or ~900Mhz depending on your location, to transmit the data a fair distance should be straightforward. On the receiving laptop side, a telemetry radio would receive the data and output it to a com port that Pingviewer should automatically detect. You may not need any Arduino board or code at all, if you select the correct radios!
If you’re using the ping360, I’d recommend using a standard tcp/ip connection, and ethernet / wifi radios as you’ll have a much higher data rate. This will result in faster scanning, which most applications would benefit from. You’d simply configure a standard wireless router to connect to another standard wireless device, and plug the ping 360 in with its ethernet connection. As long as you configure the IP range correctly, the ping360 should be detected by pingviewer with the computer connected to the same network.
Hope that’s helpful!
Hello Anthony
Thank you for your reply, I use ping Sonar 180, Can you suggest a type of radio telemetry that can reach a range of 1 km? Thanks in advance
Hi Traoré -
It depends what frequency / power levels are legal in your part of the world, but generally telemetry radios, especially with directional antennas, can achieve a 1km link that has line-of-sight without issues. Good luck!
Hello,
Here is the radio telemetry module that I was able to obtain
Link:
https://www.amazon.com/FPVDrone-Telemetry-Transmit-Pixhawk-controller/dp/B074V6FKZR
I connected the Sonar as follows:
(Radio telemetry) TX —> RX (Ping1 Sonar)
(Radio telemetry) RX —> TX (Ping1 Sonar)
both in common mass.
But I connect the radio telemetry receiver to my computer (windows), the Ping viewer application cannot detect my sonar.
Do you have any suggestions for me to make it work?
Sincerely
Hi @MahamadouDr -
Do you know what baud rate those radios are configured to communicate with? It sounds like your wiring is correct. You can verify the radios are functioning by connecting the TX to the RX on the device (non USB) side, and sending characters over the serial link from a terminal program on your computer. If they come back, the radios are working. The Ping2 communicates at a baud rate of 115200 by default, which is likely much faster than the radios are configured to use. You could either change the radios to use this baud rate, or plug the Ping2 into a computer and configure it to use the other supported baud rate of 9600. If the radios are using this baud already, that might be the quickest fix!
A quick google indicates the radios likely are talking with a baud of 57600, but this should be easy to change. You could try both 115200 and 9600 - the higher speeds can result in lower range in some cases. I’d recommend looking at the instructions to do so specific to the hardware you have. Good luck!
Good evening Anthony,
How are you doing ?
I was able to modify the baudrate of the Radio telemetry module to 9600 Baud,
But on the side of the Ping viewer software I still can’t detect the sonar.
But then I configured the radio telemetry at 115200 baud and there I was able to detect the sonar on ping viewer, the only problem is that the communication is extremely slow and ping viewer displays several RX error messages.
Below is the ping viewer image.
Sincerely
Traore Mahamadou
Hi @MahamadouDr -
As I said, with radios at 115200 it should function - glad it is! You could configure the Ping2 to use 9600 baud, and then change the radios - this might reduce the # of transmission errors, but would slow the communicatiosn rate further, by a factor of 12!
The performance issues you’re having are entirely due to the radio link. It is possible to have transmiter/receiver too close to one another, which can increase errors. But generally, you’re not going to have the same level of performance a direct connection would give. I’d experiment with better antennas or radios if you need better performance for your application!
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Good evening Anthony Okay I understand now, I would like to obtain these telemetry radios which seem to me to be of good quality, what do you think? https://holybro.com/products/sik-telemetry-radio-v3 Thank you very much for the helping hand.
@MahamadouDr
Happy to help! Those look like much better quality radios, but they may still struggle with the data rate. 2.4ghz radios would work better, but have diminished range. Setting up an ESP32 unit to talk to Ping2 and directly to your computer may be another, cheaper option? Make sure to chose the right radio frequency for the country you’re operating in!
Hello Anthony;
Sorry for all this time without news; For reasons of availability, I stopped working on the project for a while.
Currently I plan to take it again; I carried out a test this morning with two 2.4 GHz Lora modules;
I was finally able to establish the connection with the sonar with my 2.4Ghz lora modules; but the problem is that the measurements given by the sonar are incorrect; after a few minutes of operation the confidence goes to 0%;
Can you help me resolve this problem.
Best regards;
Traore Mahamadou
Hi @MahamadouDr -
Do you have the Ping2 in water when you are testing? What is your test setup?
The confidence % is a measure of how well the sonar is that it is detecting the bottom. If you are testing in a bucket or other small container it may fluctuate and not hit 100% consistently. If you have mounted the Ping2 on a device in open water, more than a foot from the bottom, it should report a higher confidence in the measurement.
For context, there’s some extra information and discussion around the meaning of the confidence in this thread 