Arduino Leo + Xbee Shield + XBee Series 1 Pro

Hello,

I have connected my Xbee Pro (Series 1) to my arduino leo using the arduino shield. However I cannot connect to the xbee using xctu, I tried setting the two jumpers on the shield to usb. I tried setting the arduino in “reset mode” by connecting the GND to Reset but that did not work. I checked the grd pin using a multi meter and it was fine, then I checked another arduino, shield and xbee and the same result.

I can program the xbee fine with the sample blink program but I cannot connect to the xbee with xctu.

What am I doing wrong?

The usb connection goes first to the microcontroller. The Leo(nardo) would need to function as a USB-to-serial converter to allow XCTU to reach the Xbee. Which it should be capable of. (EDIT: but maybe not out-of-the-box. You may need to make a sketch to pass through data and control lines between Serial and Serial1). Did you select the propper COM port in XCTU. And tried both the DLine and UART setting of the XBee shield switch?

If you want to use XCTU to update the firmware of the XBee: Once you manage to get the XBee serial passthrough to your pc, then you also need a way to connect RTS and DTR from the Xbee to the Leonardo’s pins. And write the code to use those GPIO pins to signal RTS and DTR of the virtual serial port.

In short, and quicker: I think you are better of buying the XBee USB explorer board to get this going.

I do not need to update the firmware just make a few changes to the xbee config. Could you give me an example sketch that would pass the data and control lines between serial and serial1. What are the DLine and UART setting I just moved the jumpers to usb then tried putting the arduino in reset mode as explained in th OP

Then which Xbee shield do you have? This one doesn’t have any jumpers: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10854

I’m sorry, I can’t provide a sketch. I wouldn’t be able to test it since I don’t have that Leo and shield. I just investigated on the Arduino site on what’s special about it’s serial connections.

Thanks Valen

This is the one I have https://www.sparkfun.com/products/retired/8471

Maybe someone else with first hand experience with these shields and arduino leo will be able to point me in the right direction

I found a solution to the Leonardo’s Severed-Serial-Syndrome:

http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php/topic,114936.0.html

See the code in message 8, it should bridge the “Serial” port to the “Serial1” port in both directions. But it doesn’t passthrough the control signals like RTS/DTR. And it’s allways on. Whatever the Xbee sends to the Leonardo’s microcontroller and vice versa, will end up being sent to/received by the virtual serial port of your pc aswel.

It also talks about buzzing components due to insufficient capacitors/too large current draw. I think you can ignore that.

Thank you that worked perfectly. 8) Now I need help programming the arduino to send data to the other arduino but I will create a new thread for that. I am very new to all this.