I thought I had a good place worked out on my shutter's sensor magnet, just ontop of the belt. This seemed to work fine for the shutter to close it - until it didn't. When I close the shutter remotely now what happens is the shutter stops closing about an inch or two before the sensor blocks meet or more importantly the shutter closes. Rather the biggest issue is the charging terminals can't connect when this happens.
I'm using firmware 4.0.1 . When I close with the physical buttons, things seem to work well, but not so when I use software close. Perhaps since my shutter slips/stalls in 2 spots like clockwork on the ride down, this is the cause. I've spent hours trying to get all slip spots out though so I'm not sure I can do anything more here - it's greased up and the back wheels are loosened. But after one or two slips it'll continue and close with out fail. This could throw off some firmware step counting rather than using the magnetic sensor.
What's the location and arrangement folks have used for their shutter magnet and do you notice closing quirks with it? photos please.
@Steven Green you've been responsive and seem to have good+working setup - could you provide the above?
Basically you can command the shutter with plain text commands - in the long haul it's probably good to get familiar with it and play around. You'll find it gives you an extra dimension of utility, and sometimes deals with imperfect issues like the shutter one. Other terminals (windows killed off hyperterm ) can work but it seems there's something picky about the line endings (should always be \r\n, windows style). If you consult the firmware reference you'll see the way the commands are issued. You just need to disconnect the dome software while you play with it.
Jason, 80% of what you said is Greek to me. I’m sure Babak will help you and I’m happy the shutter closed. Steven
OK this does seem to be a counts based issue. I've let Babak know but this time, since my battery still had charge and the my xbee link was still alive (often they are not) , I did the following raw serial commands (I use linux on windows to do raw serial IO):
I cat the tty (the COM# is the /dev/ttyS# ) - in the other terminal I executed raw ascom commands. I think the firmware should more robustly close and it should be an easier fix. I tried these things in hyperterm/teraterm before and it didn't work, so ubuntu is my goto.
firmware command reference: https://github.com/nexdome/ASCOM/wiki/Firmware-Protocol
Read the current position
printf "@RRS\r\n" > /dev/ttyS14
:RRS46000#
printf "@SRS\r\n" > /dev/ttyS14
:SES,0,46000,0,1#
My position was showing up as -125 if I recall right (closed my terminal by accident)
So I reset the position to 150 with
printf "@PWS,125\r\n" > /dev/ttyS14
then issued close again:
printf "@CLS\r\n" > /dev/ttyS14
Turns out only one wasn't enough, looks like it was closer to 300.
So I did the PWS,150 again and CLS once more and battery contact!
Last time I tried this xbee must've crashed but this time it worked.
It closed properly with the magnetic sensor causing it to stop.
So I succeeded in closing it remotely... this time.
Jason, I know exactly what you are describing. I’ll even bet the shutter skips with in 3“ of fully open and 10” while opening from fully closed. You’re right about motor turn counts stopping it from closing near the magnet.
Please contact Babak directly at NexDome sales@nexdome.com and let him know what’s happening and all the steps you’ve taken to get the shutter to work. I believe he’ll have a solution I’m still waiting for my new shutter panels since I’ve suffered with this for going on a year.