IGaging ez view woes

RJSakowski said:
I am using an RCA tablet running Android ver. 6.0.1. I also experience the same problem with my LG G5 phone running Android ver. 7.0. Every 5.0 seconds, there is a short pause, less than 1 second. It doesn't appear to lose counts.

I haven't checked with my Samsung A53 G5 running Android ver. 13 as I don't recall the Bluetooth pairing code.:bang head:
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Interesting. I've never heard of this happening on older Android versions. What scale adapter are you using?
Also, default pairing code should be 1234
 
Razzle said:
Lots of good suggestions. My power feed is a 12 volt car seat motor driven by a PWM module. I am using an old laptop power supply as my power source. The Dro and scales are powered by a USB power distribution block. @RJSakowski I have also experienced your update lag issue. got worse after the power feed install. I am running touchdro on a 3rd gen kindle fire tablet. So all around I haven't done myself any favors. My x axis is basically useless right now due to lag and position loss. I am definitely comfortable troubleshooting things like this and have the skills to implement. But if I am doing that I am not machining. My question really is, do you think it is worth it or am I going to still have an unreliable dro at the end. My time is limited and so are my funds. I want to make the best choice I can within those limitations.
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Well these days the only time my DROs misbehave is when their battery voltage gets low. It sounds to me like you can add the capacitors without a problem. There's enough room in the box to accommodate a fairly good sized capacitor. I used 1uF 50V plastic caps, definitely not the smallest, but I have a bunch of them on hand (I bought them by the pound at an electronics surplus store). And when you're in there you could bring out the internal ground for nailing the scale down. Electrically speaking :).

If you don't want to drill holes for terminal posts w/o knowing if it works or not you can use alligator clips to make electrical contact & evaluate the result. I confess that one of my scales still is set up that way...
 
FYI, I also made plastic scale mounting parts because somewhere I read that it's best to avoid electrical connections between the scale and mill. But that was just a waste of time and material.
 
ycroosh said:
Interesting. I've never heard of this happening on older Android versions. What scale adapter are you using?
Also, default pairing code should be 1234
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Thanks for the pairing code. I had gone back to your website and verified that it was 1234. I must have mistyped it when I first entered it. However, even though the Samsung phone is now paired, the app doesn't show the adapter as an option to connect to. Not a big deal since I have no intention of using the phone as a display, it's just annoying. As to which adapter I'm using, I would have to pull the scales apart to i.d. them. I bought the tailstock scale prior to 2012 and the x ans z scales in 2014 although they could have been older stock. I am running app version 2.5.10 on all three user interfaces.

Since all three scales are behaving the same, my assimption is that it isn't due to a scale malfunction. The precise timing suggests that it is a software issue. Possibly something in the Arduino or the shield?
 
RJSakowski said:
Thanks for the pairing code. I had gone back to your website and verified that it was 1234. I must have mistyped it when I first entered it. However, even though the Samsung phone is now paired, the app doesn't show the adapter as an option to connect to. Not a big deal since I have no intention of using the phone as a display, it's just annoying. As to which adapter I'm using, I would have to pull the scales apart to i.d. them. I bought the tailstock scale prior to 2012 and the x ans z scales in 2014 although they could have been older stock. I am running app version 2.5.10 on all three user interfaces.

Since all three scales are behaving the same, my assimption is that it isn't due to a scale malfunction. The precise timing suggests that it is a software issue. Possibly something in the Arduino or the shield?
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Arduino sketch is VERY primitive compared even to the MSP430 firmware. It runs a software loop and synchronously reads the scales. The timing of the data stream will be pretty sloppy even under good conditions. I don't think you'd see the delays, though, It would be more of a jitter. If there is clock misalignment between Arduino and HC-05, you might be getting junk in the data stream. TouchDRO app will throw it away, but you will see a pause in the display. A good way to check for this is to watch the stream via BlueTerm or similar BT terminal app. You should see clean "x12345;y12345;...". Any weird characters will cause the app to reject the reading for the given axis.
There is a thing in Android called "garbage collection", where the OS freezes the code for a fraction of a second to clean unused memory. It is possible that you will notice it, but it's usually very short (under 100 milliseconds).
Obviously "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", but I would suggest getting/building a more modern TouchDRO adapter. The new ESp32-based stuff has all sorts of trick to handle noise and glitches, and a LOT less latency when used with iGaging scales. Also, TouchDRO 3.0 is now in public Beta; if you have Android 5.0 or newer tabled, I'd switch to that.
Regards
Yuriy
 
While not a daily user, I have had zero issues with my iGaging Absolute SS scales, TouchDRO 2.5.10 Build 2016-08-12 and Galaxy TabA tablet running Android 11 updated July 21, 2022. Maybe just change out the older scales for the newer ones?
 
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ChazzC said:
While not a dairy user, I have had zero issues with my iGaging Absolute SS scales, TouchDRO 2.5.10 Build 2016-08-12 and Galaxy TabA tablet running Android 11 updated July 21, 2022. Maybe just change out the older scales for the newer ones?
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So to eliminate some confusion:
There are several types of capacitive scales. In the 3V Chinese capacitive scales group, there are three:
Shahe "Remote DRO" scales
iGaging Absolute DRO scales
iGaging "21-bit" scales (EZ-View and older DigiMag)

The first two have some issues but are completely sane and work adequately well
iGaging 21-bit scales were "designed" (for the lack of a better word) by someone who had no remote clue what they were doing.

Normal scales do their thing and then send data using some flavor of serial protocol, where the scale provides the clock signal and the data signal. This is how Mitutoyo, Starrett and everyone else who doesn't mix LSD with acid does it.

iGaging EZ-View uses a lobotomized flavor of SPI where the display provides the clock pulse and the scale sets the data bit. This could work, but:
1. iGaging scales have no input conditioning on either end (i.e. whoever copied the design probably grabbed it from an embedded device and just stuck 3' of unshielded wire, where the original design probably was on a single PCB.
2. The firmware in the scale does not implement any sort of timeout mechanism. I.e. "if I get 22 clock bits instead of 21, there was an error and next time I will start over". Instead it will just stay crooked until you power cycle the scale

In over 10 years of working on this project I know of one case of flakiness with iGaging Absolute scales, and one case when Shahe scale was acting up; every week I get at least a few emails complaining about iGaging EZ-View Scales freaking out when there is a VFD, brushed motor, etc. that looks at them crooked.
 
Yuri's information has helped enormously in informing my decision. Since I have the 21bit ez view scales I decided to bite the bullet and ordered 3 glass scales, the fet logic shifters, a new 10" tablet and db9 connectors. I will be following Yuri's excellent instructions on converting an iGaging adapter to use quadrature scales. If anyone has any experience or 'gotchas' for the conversion let me know.
The igaging scales will probably end up on my lathe. The longest scale is not quite long enough for my carriage travel (Logan 820 24') but I don't usually use all of that so I will 'make do'. Thanks to everyone for your input. This has been a great discussion.
 
You can use a portable AM radio in between stations to help locate the noise sources- I've done that in the past
 
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