Bruno PY2TOZ

I gave this #iffybooks article a try (https://github.com/iffybooks/3.3v-solar-power-station) on how to make a #Meshtastic solar node with #Heltec V3, except I tried it on a V4 instead.

To my surprise, V4's extra TX power draws up to 0.8A, which is far more than the MCP1700-3302E can withstand. So, I decided to do away with the regulator and connect the TP4056 directly to the V4's JST battery port.

Let's hope the V4 has a smarter over-discharge protection than V3 and doesn't run into a brown-out loop on low battery.

GitHub - iffybooks/3.3v-solar-power-station

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Feb 5 at 2:09amWeb
Show threadBruno PY2TOZFeb 6

I was over-engineering the solution. Differently from the #heltec V3, the V4 has dedicated battery and solar ports, so I ditched the TP4056 module altogether. The browning-out and voltage drops are gone!

Now I got another issue: when the battery reached 3% during the night, it entered a deep sleep state but didn't wake up after sunrise. I had to press a button on the device to wake it up, and found that the battery had already been charged to 25%, more than enough for it to wake up.