XBee Mesh Not Working

Wireless & IoT
1

Hi folks,

I have been trying to get a simple XBee Sensor Mesh up and working. Both of my sensor radios are able to speak to the Coordinator, but I can only receive packets from 1 at a time. Both of my endpoint are configured as routers. I will give details below of how things are configured, but will describe symptoms first.

I start up my coordinator radio and then router A. I get TX packets from A at the coordinator. I then start up router B which is connected to identical hardware. I only get packets from A, no matter how long I wait.

I then shut down radio A and I start receiving packets from B. I restart A, but only receive packets from B. I eventually shut down B and I start receiving packets from A. I can go back and forth like this for a long time. So each individual radio can contact the coordinator just fine, they just can’t do it at the same time. Everything is being tested on my workbench.

Though it shouldn’t matter, the router radios are both attached to an Arduino Pro which is reading the SHT15 temperature/humidity sensor and a light sensor. The coordinator is attached to a Sparkfun USB Explorer and is speaking to a library which knows how to obtain the packets.

All radios are S2 XBees.

The Coordinator is set for XB24-ZB. The firmware is ZigBee Coordinator API , firmware version 21A0.

The Pan ID is set for 2000. DH/DL is 0/FFFF. No Node Identifier is set. AP is set to 2. Everything else is left at the default values.

Router A is set for XB24-ZB. The firmware is ZigBee Router API, firmware version 23A0.

Pan ID, 2000. DH/DL: 0/FFFF… No Node Identifier is set. AP is set to 2. MY got FB10. Everything else is left at the default values.

Router B is set for XB24-ZB. The firmware is ZigBee Router API, firmware version 23A0.

Pan ID, 2000. DH/DL: 0/FFFF… No Node Identifier is set. AP is set to 2. MY got A107. Everything else is left at the default values.

Thoughts?

-Keith

2

too late to use Xbee Series 1?

Simpler. Better.

3

Not quite the answer I was looking for!

:smiley:

So did I phrase the question wrong, or has no one on this forum done a Series 2 Sensor mesh? If the former, perhaps a better question is has anyone done a Series 2 Sensor Mesh before and can they give me the details of what they did?

I tried to give enough detail, but I am new to the forum so probably screwed something up.

4

I asked over at the Digi forums. If I get an answer and anyone here is interested, I will post the eventual solution.

The initial project is to put temperature, humidity, and light sensors in every room of the house connected by XBee. I need the mesh to cover the 3 floors. The data will then be taken in at a point and used to collect data and also be the thermostat for the house. I also have a relay board that will be used to control the heater zones.

The evolving software for the project is here: https://github.com/kmhughes/robotbrains … roomsensor

5

Don’t ask on the forum, search and read the forum as well as the Digi Int App Notes and Xbee documents. This has all been explained which is why you probably will not get an answer on their forum.

6

I actually did get a couple of answers on the Digi forum

I did finally figure out the solution.

I checked on the sensor radios and they were getting the acknowledge packet back. I finally checked with another library for the coordinator and saw packets from both radios. I also saw packets from both using XCTU-NG. At this point I figured it was the library I was using, and sure enough, I found a bug.

OK, now I can get on to doing something with the data.