Hi,

Step by Step

I set up UPS PIco HV4.0B/C like described in the manual. I had some trouble getting the current firmware on the UPS,

OK.

the serial communication could not be established, I managed then to upload the current firmware 179 with invoking

Do you have any additional HAT connected on TOP (if so please remove it or disable on it the serial port)?

the manual bootloader mode at the point in the firmware uploader skript, where the loop around trying to communicate over serial with the ups happens.

Please check also if you have activated serial port

I would like to use the UPS now with only a supercap and no secondary battery.  I do not have the pogo pins installed

POGO PIN is Mandatory (both) otherwise it is possible you will have some reboots until SC discharge

and would like to not use them if possible. 

Try it, as I said, possible you will have some reboots, until SC discharge completely

like it says in the manual (Selects power source the 100F Supercapacitor as the ONLY Power Backup source - (Single Mode)).

OK

 
  Powering Mode..............................: Cable POWERED
  Power Backup Set Mode......................: Mixed Bat/SCap Backup

I check it, next days, as will be completing new firmware for it

However please note that 100F is only for max 15 second run 

The raspberry is powered with USB (official power device 5V@5A), fan is working,  

rtc is working.The Daemon is running and the light SYS is blinking at around 700ms and

the SCA led is on permanently.

OK.  The SCA LED Light mean that it is charged. But you must have not mixed mode

So the supercap is fully loaded now and I unplug the USB power, what happens than is

that the raspberry dies off quite quickly and I think it does not regulary shutdown.

Please describe it in more details

I commented out the "sudo shutdown now -h" commands in the daemon and the

raspberry stops nevertheless.

However, the green activity led keeps on blinking 

and the supercap seem to be discharging as the correspondin led turns off.

The green led of the raspberry blinks and the sys led from the UPS stays on until the

the supercap is discharged (which takes longer than 1 min like I would think the battery

timer should shutwdon the UPS?).

POGO PIN BOTH ARE NEEDED 🙁

Could you maybe give me a hint, if there is any other setting I can make or I

misunderstood something?

for 99% POGO PINS  are needed, I'm so sorry.

In any case we have mostly ready the new firmware, and release it in next days, so I will check your points until next Monday on the workbench. Currently I'm writing new firmware for the M.2 - UPS (same micro controller). If you not have any additional hardware the  100 F is fine, if have any extra HAT please be sure if 15 s for shutdown is fine, if not use bigger SC or combination of them (parallel connection)

Best regards

Pi Master

PS. Due to silicon bug, reported by Microchip, we ware to obligated re-write the I2C handler, taking into account all required changes by Microchip

Thanks for your quick reply!

Ok, I will try this evening to install the pogo pins and see how it goes.

Concerning the serial interface: I went through the steps in the manual and activated it, however there seemed to be no acknowledge from UPS side until I manually brought it into bootloader mode. There was no other hardware connected apart from the UPS.

I have a video showing what happens when I unplug USB from the raspberry. Shall I maybe send it to you somehow? Maybe in a few more words:

When I remove the USB plug the raspberry instantly dies (both red and green light from raspberry turn off). After about 2 seconds red and green led relight and after a while green seems to change into a regular blink rythm. This rythm continues until the capacitor is discharged (order of magnitude of some minutes).

Just for my understanding:

• Is it correct that without pogo pins the power is instantly gone and the raspberry simply is off?
• Should the battery timer turn off the ups also independent of the pogo pins after one minute (because this does not happen)?

Thanks for now and best regards

Hey,

I did some more testing. I installed the pogo pins and for the supercap this did not improve the situation, if the USB supply is removed, the pi dies without time to properly shut down.

I then installed the lipo (0x4C) and sent the appropriate i2c message. I can see in the status that this worked and that the power backup mode is now also only "battery backup". When I remove the USB supply the raspberry now is still powered and I can query the powering mode to properly shut it down. However, the battery timer does not seem to work properly. The UPS does not shutdown after the default "1 min" but keeps on running.

So I would have two remaining questions:

* Did I miss something concerning the shutdown timer of the pico because it stays powered until the backup power is drained?

* Why does the raspberry not stay powered if supercap is the backup method (power backup mode shows mixed mode...) and USB supply removed?

Thanks and BR

Hi,

Posted by: @funkyteilchen

↑

I did some more testing. I installed the pogo pins and for the supercap this did not improve the situation, if the USB supply is removed, the pi dies without time to properly shut down.

Is the SC fully charged. I mean  the SCA LED is lighting?

Posted by: @funkyteilchen

↑

I then installed the lipo (0x4C) and sent the appropriate i2c message. I can see in the status that this worked and that the power backup mode is now also only "battery backup". When I remove the USB supply the raspberry now is still powered and I can query the powering mode to properly shut it down. However, the battery timer does not seem to work properly. The UPS does not shutdown after the default "1 min" but keeps on running.

Posted by: @funkyteilchen

↑

* Did I miss something concerning the shutdown timer of the pico because it stays powered until the backup power is drained?

Posted by: @funkyteilchen

↑

* Why does the raspberry not stay powered if supercap is the backup method (power backup mode shows mixed mode...) and USB supply removed?

If you select SC, system is automatically set the proper timings, so if NOT the most possible reason is the the SC is not charged enough. The SC must lit to be able to use SC.

Please advise

BR PiMaster

Yes, the supercap is fully charged (was charging over night), led is on as well.

The battery timer does not work both for battery and supercap, can I query another register via i2c to see if it is really counting down?

BR

Hey,

Ok, I finally understood how the battery timer works, I misunderstood it at first in the daemon code. So when the UPS checks that external power is removed it needs to be still continously queried for the status to stay active. When the UPS then counted down the 70s it sends a 0xCC signal on which you can send a 0xAA to make the UPS turn off after the raspberry received the shutdown signal. For the battery this works now for me.

Still for the supercap as I like to have it in single mode, this does not work, after about 5s when external power is removed the raspberry just dies. As mentioned above, sudo i2cset -y 1 0x6b 0x07 0x43, sets super cap as source but in the status print I says "mixed mode". In the manual it also says that after about 5s in mixed mode the power source is switched from supercap to battery, so this would suit I guess. (However, when I attach in this setting both battery and supercap, they do not charge).

* So is it a firmware bug, that the supercap does not run in single mode as intended?

* With battery attached I tested to send an immediate 0xAA and raspberry shutdown when I see that external power is gone. The raspberry shuts down but then the UPS stays alive until the power is drained. Is this intended and if yes, is there a way to immediatly shutdwon pi and the UPS completely without battery timer? I did not find how to do this in the manual.

I would really like to make this work as I want to use this UPS in a product we are making.

BR 

@funkyteilchen 

Hi,

I check it, however in the former one version of firmware it was working, last version was not tested, but also not touched, so should be working

I will be back to you soon with testing.

BR PiMaster