Rainmachine 16 PRO restarting randomly
RM 16PRO keeps restarting randomly. This can happen during the watering cycle (any zone at any time, which is annoying because the cycle does not get completed) or outside of the watering cycle - therefore I do not think it is a stuck valve or a short. The up time shown on the home page is never more than 2 days. What could it be? The log is not showing anything interesting - no entires suggesting a software-initiated reboot. Looks like power loss? I ordered a new (more powerful) transformer to check, but what if not?
-
It is just a typical 24V transformer that is used with AC thermostats, alarms, etc.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B085WPNC29?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details (40 VA, or 1660 mA). -
After 10 days, RM restarted again yesterday at approx 21:30 EST. Nothing in the log indicates the reason:
2022-06-20 17:54:05,938 - INFO - rmSimulator:651 - Frequency MODULATION pid=1, zid=6: AW to next day tmachine=247.743911913 waterNeeded=1.7146385063 2022-06-20 17:54:05,958 - INFO - rmSimulator:651 - Frequency MODULATION pid=1, zid=7: AW to next day tmachine=247.743911913 waterNeeded=1.7146385063 2022-06-20 17:54:05,978 - INFO - rmSimulator:651 - Frequency MODULATION pid=1, zid=8: AW to next day tmachine=109.177050379 waterNeeded=0.755442730356 2022-06-20 21:32:41,866 - INFO - main:51 - RainMachine v2 Copyright (c) 2015 Green Electronics LLC 2022-06-20 21:32:41,879 - INFO - main:52 - Running on platform RainMachine5 OS 2022-06-20 21:32:41,914 - INFO - main:69 - Ethernet IP: 192.168.11.1, MAC: 08:be:77:00:96:25, hasClientLink: 1 20
-
Ok, Piotr
Were the watering events affected?
Also, would you please check your surrounding Wi-Fi networks not to have a SSID that has special characters in it? Like &%:£/;@ and so on or emojis?
RainMachine Pro Wi-Fi driver has some issues with those characters used on SSID network names and make the device to reboot.Another thing you should have the RAINMACHINE DEVICE Mobile app Notification category with all ON. Maybe it is a wiring issue with one of your zones.
Let us know, Piotr
Thank you
Justin -
Hi, Piotr
Message from the team:
- please use the provided power adapter if you can. The one you bought it is too strong for the RainMachine Pro and it may cause harm in the long term.
- check your valves for issues. It may be one of your valves that sends over current and makes the Pro device to reboot
- even if you are connected with the Ethernet, the Wi-Fi can be active and scans for the networks in your area. If one of those networks has SSIDs with names containing those characters or emojis, the Pro will reboot. We know abot this and we try to find a fix for the Pro Wi-Fi driver.Let us know, Piotr
Thank you
Justin -
When I was using the provided power adapter, this was happening every few hours. Also, I do not understand how can a power supply be too strong? As long as the voltage is correct, it usually cannot be. It can be not enough powerful, though (and then you have a voltage drop). If you think otherwise, please explain with details. I am always happy to learn something new (as long as it is not "it is because we are telling you that it is").
Not sure how to check the valves. I never had problems with them. None of them ever gets stuck, nor is leaking. The only thing I can think of was the soli humidity sensor that was piggybacked on one of the valve wires, I will see what happens.
The wifi adapter (ra0) was active indeed, see below, even though I disabled it in the interface. I have now manually disabled it in the cli, let's see what happens.
root@RainMachine5:~# ifconfig
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 08:BE:77:00:96:25
inet addr:192.168.11.1 Bcast:192.168.11.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
inet6 addr: fe80::abe:77ff:fe00:9625/64 Scope:Link
inet6 addr: fd58:7806:b595:10::1/60 Scope:Global
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:8797 errors:0 dropped:3 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:6349 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:2140635 (2.0 MiB) TX bytes:2642870 (2.5 MiB)
Interrupt:5
lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:65536 Metric:1
RX packets:280989 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:280989 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1
RX bytes:77663220 (74.0 MiB) TX bytes:77663220 (74.0 MiB)
ra0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 08:BE:77:00:A9:D5
inet addr:192.168.13.1 Bcast:192.168.13.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
inet6 addr: fd58:7806:b595::1/60 Scope:Global
inet6 addr: fe80::abe:77ff:fe00:a9d5/64 Scope:Link
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)
Interrupt:6
-
Hi, Piotr
The technical team explained to me that the protections inside RainMachine are rated a little above the adapter max amperage (750mA). If the current from a short/over-current reaches RainMachine above this threshold there is a good chance that RainMachine can be fried.
A maximum of 1A output would be recommended. Yours has 1.6A that is more than double of the provided adapter has 0.7A output.Again, this is because of the internal protection of the RainMachine Pro.
It works with yours too, but not recommended long term...
Let us know if you find anything related to your valves. Since you shut down the Wi-Fi radio, we will rule out the reboot because of the surrounding wi-fi SSIDs names.Thank you
Justin -
After a few days, it started doing it again - restarting randomly. The WiFi adapter is disabled completely. The next thing I tried was to disable the watchdog. I did it, and it seems stable again. I would appreciate is someone from RM would let me know what are the options listed in the /etc/rainmachine-watchdog.conf file. Perhaps it has something to do with the way the watchdog is behaving.
-
Should be pretty self explanatory pipe_* configs are related to client that connects to the cloud. We check if that hangs and reboot.
rest_* options are checking if the build-in HTTP server doesn't respond or responds too slow. Values are in seconds.
Maybe the device gets overwhelmed with request/calculations and responds slowly ?
rest_addr=127.0.0.1
rest_port=18080
rest_url=/api/apiVer
pipe_name=/tmp/watchdog-pipe
main_delay=5
rest_timeout=180
rest_timeout_boot=360
rest_get_timeout=3
rest_check_interval=20
pipe_timeout=180 -
Hi, did you find a cause of this?
I had a rainmahine that wouldn't reboot, but would freeze with the lights on but screen dead. When rebooting by unplugging, waiting and plugging in again it would work for 1-2 days then it would occur again. Support ended up saying it was faulty and I could purchase a new one at a discounted price, which I did though not long after it occurred again. I purchased a brand new power supply rated at 24VAC 1000mA and after setting up it seems to reboot/freeze when trying to run zones etc.
I configured syslog on it to view the logs. When it reboots it always has "watchdog watchdog0: watchdog did not stop!" in the logs. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks
-
In case anyone else is trying to resolve similar issues, I found that as soon as I started using ethernet rather than WiFi, all my issues went away. I actually factory reset the device but then set it up using ethernet instead of wifi.
I found multiple posts about the bad wifi chip in these things so decided to try without. To my surprise it has worked perfectly ever since for me.
Hope that helps someone else.
Please sign in to leave a comment.
Comments
19 comments