John Deere AOG Project (6630, Hydraulic valve)

CB radio also works on a completely different frequency and the radio wave propagates differently, works even without line-of-sight connection.

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Update…

Been in the field alot this week, and overall, so so happy. Variety of jobs, and getting perfectly straight lines on the whole.

Only really two main issues at the moment.

1 - Am still finding in high draft / hill situations, AOG doesn’t command enough steering angle to maintain its position on line, it will pull it back on the line so far, and then just stop, Its like in a PID loop, with no I, so cant build gain and pull back on the line… as said 75% of the time its not a problem, but if you have any implements with side draft, or soil allowing the tractor to drift alot, it isn’t able to, working around it at the moment shifting the line uphill, which works as long as the hill is constant, but obviously if it changes during the run, will give a bend.

Spent alot of time messing with PID settings etc thinking I had it set wrong, but from what I can see, the arduino loop, of which is what you control with the PID settings in the autosteer section, are all for the loop that controls the output…IE matches the real wheel angle, with the requested wheel angle from AOG? Which it is doing perfectly, and extremely smoothly now with latest version of AOG, there is never a situation where its drifting off line, and the actual steering angle isnt meeting the request, the problem is always that AOG just isnt asking for any further angle, despite it drifting further and further from the line… @BrianTee_Admin anything in the future possible to try and combat this behaviour?

2 - The only other problem which came apparent over the last few days relates to NTRIP, for the last week I have been working on one side of my farm which is largely covered by my long range wifi link to the tractor, and / or has good 4g cell coverage, so ntrip corrections have been 100% spot on, and its been driving superbly…

However this last few days I have been on the other side of a valley, where I don’t have my long range wifi (yet), so solely relying on 4g cell data, which on the whole is great, however nearly every field seems to have a tiny area / blackspot where it doesn’t work. Realistically these areas probably never add up to the tractor being out of data for more than 20-30 seconds, if that…but its enough that AOG looses connection and starts to wait / attempt re connecting… This is where I am running into some problems.
Loosing the ntrip corrections for 20-30 seconds in general shouldnt be an issue, as the F9P hangs onto the last known correction for i think 240 seconds anyway, which is always enough time to get data back / carry on. But for some reason, I am finding AOG keeps locking up momentarily / hanging up for a few seconds when its in the “wait” or reconnecting stage…the numbers on the display will stop updating, and autosteer stops working, then a few seconds later it just clicks back into life and carries on. As said, never does this when connected / will run for hours faultlessly…its just always in that moment of reconnection it seems to do it…which creates some issues as tractor will just move off line until it responds again.

Have just setup RTKLIB STRSVR and a virtual serial port, which acts as an NTRIP client and fowards to UDP (the F9P), so have disabled the AOG ntrip client, and will run with this over the next few days, to see if that removes that issue. if so, not really a hassle to just run that as the ntrip client, although it is useful to have it in AOG, as means you can keep an eye on its status easily from single window… Anyone else finding this ever happens? Maybe something specific to my setup / UDP comms?

Picture of the corrections working via rtklib:

rtklibfix

I’m not really sure, but it could be something to do with getting the host ip/details in the background (unless this only runs at program startup?). i’ve had issues with an older version where a 3g modem dropping out would briefly disconnect the windows network it was generating - and AgOpenGPS did not like that, even though rtklib/the gps had no issue with the internal ports/addresses they were using.
Are you using a router between your modem, and the AgOpenGPS computer?

No, it just connects directly to wifi tether on my mobile phone…although technically my phone in that situation is acting as a router…

Have ran it today with rtklib instead of the built in ntrip client, and works wonderfully, AOG dosnt glitch at all, and the F9P never went below RTK fix in entire field…STRSVR just dropped / carried on if the data disappeared for a few seconds, and AOG never knew any different :slight_smile: Would be cool to figure out why the AOG client is causing problems, but this works great for now at least anyway…

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A thought to the problems I / a few others are having with AOG not pulling to the line in hillside / high draft situations…

I use dual GPS, so AOG roll is turned off, as the incoming GPS feed is already roll compensated…This means I cant use the hillside draft gain setting, as AOG has no roll to work with…

Was thinking if the option to use hillside draft but NOT roll compensation was allowed, it would be possible to send the roll value from ESP to AOG, or even just use the MMA for now, for the extra hillside draft gain which would potentially help the situation alot… Granted still not ideal, as would be forever changing this setting I think for different conditions / implements, really just need to find a fix so it keeps pulling to the line with integral value in AOG calculation or something…

Thought id post some pictures over the last few days during silage here at home.

Super pleased overall with progress / working so well.

Have successfully overcome my glitching on RTK signal loss by using STRSVR from rtklib and turning of AOG ntrip client, now works smoothly 100% of time, made a huge difference, must be something specific to my setup as haven’t heard anyone else report those issues, but might be of help to someone if they do run into issues.

Quick video I made of a few clips:

And some photos:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

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Nice work, how did you manage the wayline issue with the tool offset? I was thinking managing it with an antenna offset when I did a bit of raking with an old asymmetric tool.

Not got this figured out yet, I tried setting an offset in AOG for the implement, but for some reason that cause AOG to keep flicking between lines when on track, its something I need to look into more, for now I have just set the width, and just shift the line every other pass to move over the width of the windrow for example, not ideal but works fine for now.

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I would like to know, how you finally set up your hydraulic steering. Do you only use the Hydraforce SP57C valve and found some good working settings in aog, or did you add a pressure compensator as mentioned above?

We were spaying with a small tool and a large turning radius. Hard to stay on the line and very hard to find the right line during the u-turn. (We were not using auto steer). Hacked into the code and built a stickyAB button. It simply changed lines when we told it to. Right or left buttons were modified to jump right or left a given number of steps. Worked very well for us, just stop at the end of the row, offset where you want and u-turn. Just a thought.

It is running with no pressure compensator at all, there is no need for it now, all these do is slow down the “max flow” which isn’t a problem anyway, its gaining control of the fine flow thats the hard part, but with correct settings, and latest version, its easily possible. Its super smooth now, the key was adding the reduction in output as it got close to the line, giving it much finer control when it needed it, this has made it super smooth.

I’m interested in your NH T5 Installation. Maybe it’s helpful for my Case IH Farmall 115U Pro installation.
Are you able to post some photos.
Is there also in the orbitrol tank line the transmission lubrication connected (serial)?
What is your experience with the spool size L5 (27l/min) of your prop valve, is L3 (17l/min) more suitable?

I took a few photos but they probably deleted and the tractor is 50km apart. But in 1-2 weeks I’ll be close and I’ll make new ones. In the topic of steering sensors I pasted the steering sensor solution in this tractor.
The hydraulic system looks like the proportional and 6-way valves are located in front of the radiator and the hoses are drawn under the radiator.
Alternatively, I have a list of matched hoses needed to connect the valves to the system.

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Where did you find the parts list for your hydraulic setup? Im planning on swapping my steering motor for hydraulic, on the 6930 (i fancy a new challenge). I imagine i will need the same parts, just longer pipe runs, as i will have to connect to power beyond etc at the rear of the tractor.
What was the website you used? Im also in UK… Yorkshire!

Thanks for your hint regarding mounting steering sensor.
I’m interested in your list of matched hoses, if it’s still available.

Mostly from hydrostar, and then used another online company to make up the hoses, but could just have easily gone to my local hydraulic place and they could have done it all also, just easier to write down all the lengths etc i needed and order it all online one evening when I had time.

Little update to the project,

Wanted to get my dual antenna setup using ethernet rather than WiFi,

A because always concerns me with slight delay / lag using the wireless, and B / more importantly, WiFi always takes 30-60 seconds to re-connect and start talking everytime you start the tractor as the WiFi AP has to reboot, then the connection has to establish, its not a huge issue, but a little annoying, the ethernet to the autosteer board is virtually instant, 3-4 seconds on power up, and data is moving / things are working, so wanted this for the antenna setup also.

At this point there was no ethernet code / support directly, so I used a TTL-UDP server/client module (many available from china, very cheap), configured it for this application, put the ESP into serial output mode, actually entirely disabled the wifi and hotspot for fast boot, just configure using the code, then it just outputs over TTL to the UDP server, and then over ethernet to AOG. RTCM comes back in via the same link.

While I was doing the conversion I also built a new box, using an @Aortner Dual PCB, there was nothing really wrong with my old stack setup, and was very compact, but did make it awkward to work on, access, and also, required mods to the F9P’s by means of soldering wires on, which meant in the event of a failure, you had to mess around modding etc, vs now can just pull one card out, and drop a stock new one in… I havent had one fail, but its always nice to know in the event of a failure, its just a config flash, plug it in and away you go…

For anyone wanting to use ethernet its a solution, although I think @MTZ8302 is now working on a implementing ethernet support directly in the ESP, which would be even better again / one less step, if and when this is working I will just remove the TTL-UDP server and replace with whatever Ethernet module is decided to use with the ESP.

Photo of the new arrangement:

PXL_20210110_130453456

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How were you able to establish the Serial Connection to the SF3000?

Some of the pins on the connector are serial, you need to enable to serial output to on / correct settings inside greenstar though, or using starfire configurator in windows first.

Oh ok, thanks and by the way great Project :metal: