HTCC-AB02, LowPower and LiPo battery solar charge

#1

Looking for the correct way to connect power for my device based on HTTC-AB02 (and AB01)

The thing is that my device should work during all winter season in outdoor conditions (mountains).
It means a lot of cold so I decided to keep the battery on the ground level under snow, which is the most “warmer” place it this situation - average temperature is about 0 degree Celsius during all winter season.
I have a few of such devices (with another MCU based on Arduino+LoRa module) that works OK every winter since 2015 year.
And most of the time these devices are in lowpower mode (about 10uA)

Another thins is that the device itself should be placed on the high about 3m from the ground.
So it this situation we have the long power wire from device to the battery - about 3.5-4m…

For HTCC-AB02, as far I understand, for achieving the best lowpower mode - I need connect the battery to the battery connector JST 1.25.
As far I know - this is the ONLY way to have the best lowpower consuption.
- Am I right?
or I can power the AB02 board via another V* pin and achieve also good power consumption in sleep mode?

The question is - what is the right way to charge battery which connected to the board via such long wire (3.5 -4m)?
If I use some solar panel and connect it to the VS pin - will it charge the battery on this long wire?

I think this is the very long wire and seems it will prevent to charging…

also I have some questions related to the lowpower.

  • is there any examples how to put AB02 to lowpower for some desired time (lets say - 60 sec)

  • do I need somehow configure states of GPIO pins before going to sleep?

  • please advice the good way to measure the consumptions in the lowpower state. usually I use multimeter but probably nowadays there is some special devices which can be connected into power circuit?

thanks in advance)

#2

From my reading of the board schematics, and personal experience, you need to power the CubeCell dev-boards through the [JST 1.25] battery connector if you want to charge the battery through the on-board charging circuitry (i.e. solar panel connected to Vs).

I don’t know that a 3-4m wire will inhibit charging from a solar panel. You may just need to ensure that the gauge of the wire that you are using is ‘appropriate’. I have a Davis anemometer sensor that is ~2m away from a processor and I don’t see any problem there (with what is essentially telephone wire). Charge flowing in one direction or the other (to and from a sensor, or from a solar panel) shouldn’t make any difference.

There are examples of how to use low power mode in the IDE examples—Arduino IDE > File > Examples > Basics > LowPower

I use a Nordic Semiconductor PPK2 to measure current usage.

All the details of my operating environment (I don’t have to deal with snow [very often] where I am) and applications are available here.

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