XBEE mesh network

Wireless & IoT
1

Hi, I’m trying to build a XBEE mesh network.

The idea is that I have a couple of measuring devices (XBEE routers) that collect data and than send it to my XBEE coordinator. The problem that I run into is that some of the routers are out of range for direct communication with the coordinator. Supposedly XBEE should be capable of solving this by sending the out of reach data through a router closer to the coordinator, but in practise this doesn’t seem to work for me. Direct communication is no problem but they don’t seem to use each other as throughput.

Has anybody have any experience with this and could someone help me with tips/code? Please?

My consists of five routers and one coordinator all running the API firmware. The routers talk to the coordinator by sending a message to 0x00000000.

Might there be anything I have to set in the XBEE firmware to get them to route through each other?

2

Which XBee’s are you using? Series 1 or 2

Which protocol are they running?

Post the Firmware version that will ID the XBee’s and protocol.

sending a message to 0x00000000.

Is this the send to Address?

Try sending the data to the coordinator’s 64 bit address.

If you query the nearer Router’s connection table does it report a connection to the distant router?

(See the XBee doc for the proper commands to do this).

3

I’m using the API mode on series 2. One is running the Zigbee Coordinator API (v 21A7) and the other ones are running Zigbee Router API (v 23A7).

The 0x00000000 address is were the routers are sending to (the coordinator)

waltr:
f you query the nearer Router’s connection table does it report a connection to the distant router?

I have no idea how to do this, so I'll have to look it up.

What I am doing however is letting the coordinator send out a Many-To-One broadcast every 20 seconds (by setting the AR command in XCTU). This doesn’t seem to do much good unfortunately.

4

Hmm. Sending to the coordinator by using it’s specific address only seems to make things worse. Now nothing arrives anymore.

Btw. I’m using a max/msp patch to readout the coordinator and both the routers are on a arduino running the Series2_Tx demo from the XBEE library.

5

Oh…

I use series 2 XBees running ZigBee and have remote XBees that relay through a router.

However, the remotes are running AT firmware and have the sending address set in their DL & DH registers. They also at setup to periodically make a measurement (on their ADC and digital inputs) which is sent to the coordinator.

Is this how your remote Xbees are setup? Or do you have another device (processor) sending API serial packets into the remote XBee’s UART?

If so is the API Packet and checksum correct? It it is not then the XBee silently ignores the packet which is difficult to troubleshoot.

6

I have two remote units that run the Xbee API Router firmware. The data is collected by an microcontroller and then send to the radio via the UART. Checksum and everything is allright because the coordinator receives the packages. The only problem is that when one of the units goes out of range the data is lost instead of being send through the other router.

7

when one of the units goes out of range

Oh.. The remote units can move around and need to change the network path to send data back.

I haven’t needed to do that so this will take some study of the XBee docs.

One though I have is have the u-controller check on its XBee network connection and if not there have the XBee re-join. This is only theory and I’m unsure of exactly how to do this.

There may be some info on this at Digi Int’s web site or their User’s forum.