First Run this weekend


 
G

Greg Fountaine

TVWBB Member
I ran into something weird.

I had the HM powered up and running in my office for a few days, testing it with a hot water pot and fiddling with the settings some - getting familiar with alarms, etc. It worked flawlessly thru multiple power cycles, no problems. Got the wifi setup and had all that working.

I go to setup the smoker on Saturday - 85, in sunlight on my deck which is probably warmer (mid/low 90's) - and the HM is spazzing out on me.
It seemed like it was rebooting spontaneously - I couldn't connect to it via wifi. I'd disconnect it all, carry it inside and test it in my office.
The settings would changed - it would go to the default probe instead of a thermocouple, the temperature settings got scrambled, my email info was all reset to default. Weird.

I'd make all the adjustments and retest it, no problem. Carry it back outside, it would run ok for a bit and then spazz out again. I brought it back in and left it alone for an hour or so while I did other stuff. Then I got all the settings back to where I wanted them, powered down and carried it back outside.

This time, the sun is now behind my house - I'm in the shade and the temps are dropping because we had a cold front come thru.

Except for the lid open/lid closed issue I posted about, it finished out the cook flawlessly - you can see it in my chart of the last half of the smoke -
18118847_10203218151010386_2821676656356852745_n.jpg



Would being on the hot side be an issue? I do have it in the standard box Bryan sells,...

Appreciate thoughts!
Greg
 
Did you have the blower plugged in, in your office? Do you have a blower and damper setup? I've had problems with shorts in the blower/damper circuit in the past, that presented with the same symptoms as you describe.
 
I wasn't very disciplined in my "testing" it was more ad hoc. I did have the fan attached on one of the hot water pot tests, but, it was short lived (a couple minutes to get from cold to boil) - it has been connected up for days but without having the fan on it - just having it track temps on the probes.

I went ahead and ordered another 3A 12V power supply out of suspicions that the 1.5A maybe on the edge - the 1A didn't work at all (even with the fan not connected). I've got another smoke going this weekend, we'll see if it behaves better.
 
Right after I posted this, the controller spazzed out again - noticed the target temp went from 67 to 92 - after I changed the pit temp back, the gui froze up and the display started scrolling this sequence
[video]https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipMvFtX2zS4zOSATsknoFyNpprwQEgnZYH90BjOLwvNwgS Yh0TAwUuCKQbIRFC_QEg?key=a1NESE1WWEhFX0o4bHNyN3NFQ lh4VFUybDA3SUNB[/video]
 
Last edited:
Hi Greg. I just joined and posted in the intro thread. I too have just gotten my HeaterMeter setup going but have yet to do a smoke.
I have also been running into a similar issue where I believe my HeaterMeter spazzes out and resets. All of my settings stay put though so I don't have that problem.

What I HAVE noticed is that mine runs ok until I start making web requests to it to pull up the dashboard monitor on my laptop or I start messing with too many configurations on via the webpages from my laptop. Additionally it seems to reset when my PitDroid app connects.

I am about to make post with my issues to see if anyone has any feedback. If you see any similar behavior please let me know and I will do the same if I see the same as yours :)
 
Huge THANK YOU to Bryan for helping me debug my build! Just ran a series of checks and I had a solder joint on a ground I missed and I had a couple of bad solder joints on a resistor. Gave everything a good look over and touched up any suspicious looking joints.
Seems to be running great now!!!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top