Skip to content

Home

Jump to bottom
William Lehmus edited this page Jul 17, 2019 · 29 revisions

Welcome to the ConnectedLIAM wiki!#

This wiki explains how to connect your LIAM diy lawnmower using wifi and a IoT phone app called Blynk. There are two parts. If you only want to connect your lawnmower you only need to follow the guide for LIAM. If you also want to connect your base station you have to follow that guide as well.

What is this mod?

  • Wifi connectivity and remote control to your Liam DIY Lawnmower
  • Remote monitoring of activity, battery voltage, wifi RSSI, inside/outside the cable
  • Remote terminal from phone app
  • Easy remote debugging. No need to connect to computer.
  • Order your liam to cut your lawn or go to base station
  • REST API for integration with Home assistant or third party software
  • Remote on/off of BWF driver
  • --PLANNED-- Rainsensor in base station. Lawnmower automatically docks if it rains
  • --PLANNED-- Automatically turns of charging contacts when mower is out mowing
  • --PLANNED-- Periodically checks cable integrity and notifies if cable is broken

This is a addon to Liam diy lawnmower found at:

  1. GITHUB: https://github.com/sm6yvr/liam
  2. FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/groups/319588508137220/
  3. PARTS STORE: http://www.microcutter.se/

Parts needed:

  1. a working Liam DIY Lawnmower running the original Liam Code on an arduino. This addon has been tested with the latest version 5.4
  2. A Node-MCU microcontroller. It´s a 3.3v microcontroller that is 5v tolerant which makes it easy to connect to an arduino
  3. male to female dupont cables (standard arduino cables..)

Software needed:

  1. BLYNK arduino library (Found in library manager in Arduino IDE)
  2. BLYNK phone app
  3. If you don't already know how to add support for NODE-MCU in Arduino IDE follow this guide: https://www.instructables.com/id/Quick-Start-to-Nodemcu-ESP8266-on-Arduino-IDE/
  4. ESPcoms.ino. Put this in your Liam folder and follow the instructions in the file.
  5. Liam_ESP_addon.ino. Change the wifi details and add your Blynk token and then upload this to your ESP

Connections:

  1. NODE-MCU TX -> Morgan Shield Bluetooth RX (Optional right now as communication is one way, this will prob change)
  2. NODE-MCU RX -> Morgan shield Bluetooth TX
  3. NODE-MCU GND -> Morgan shield GND.
  4. Arduino any +5v coming out from the morgan shield to NODE-MCU Vin

You will need to disconnect the NODE-MCU TX -> Morgan Shield Bluetooth RX everytime you upload a new code. This is due to that Arduino UNO only has one channel for serial communication. The serial port works very much like a phone line, you'll get the busy tone if you try to call someone that is already on the phone, in this case if you have the ESP connected through serial your computer will get the busy tone from the arduino when trying to upload.

Modifications to original LIAM Code:

A lot of effort has been put in to making this mod as simple as possible to add but since LIAM was never meant to be connected so some modifications to the code is necessary.

Look in ESPcoms.ino file and follow the instructions. You need to copy some variables to global variable space and to void loop. Don't copy it all, only the indicated stuff in the file. I'm using a serial speed of 115200 baud. Make sure to change this in Void Setup in Liam.ino

Clone this wiki locally