11 KiB
DD3 LoRa Bridge (Multi-Sender)
Unified firmware for LilyGO T3 v1.6.1 (ESP32 + SX1276 + SSD1306) that runs as Sender or Receiver based on a GPIO jumper. Senders read DD3 smart meter values, compress JSON, and transmit over LoRa. The receiver validates packets, publishes to MQTT, provides a web UI, and shows per-sender status on the OLED.
Hardware
Board: LilyGO T3 LoRa32 v1.6.1 (ESP32 + SX1276 + SSD1306 128x64 + LiPo) Variants:
- SX1276 433 MHz module (default build)
- SX1276 868 MHz module (use 868 build environments)
Pin Mapping
- LoRa (SX1276)
- SCK: GPIO5
- MISO: GPIO19
- MOSI: GPIO27
- NSS/CS: GPIO18
- RST: GPIO23
- DIO0: GPIO26
- OLED (SSD1306)
- SDA: GPIO21
- SCL: GPIO22
- RST: not used (SSD1306 init uses
-1reset pin) - I2C address: 0x3C
- I2C RTC (DS3231)
- SDA: GPIO21
- SCL: GPIO22
- I2C address: 0x68
- Battery ADC: GPIO35 (via on-board divider)
- Role select: GPIO13 (INPUT_PULLDOWN)
- LOW = Sender
- HIGH = Receiver
- OLED control: GPIO14 (INPUT_PULLDOWN)
- HIGH = force OLED on
- LOW = allow auto-off after timeout
- Smart meter UART RX: GPIO34 (input-only, always connected)
Notes on GPIOs
- GPIO34/35/36/39 are input-only and have no internal pullups/pulldowns.
- Strap pins (GPIO0/2/4/5/12/15) can affect boot; avoid for role or control jumpers.
Firmware Roles
Sender (battery-powered)
- Reads smart meter via optical IR (UART 9600 7E1).
- Extracts OBIS values:
- Energy total: 1-0:1.8.0*255
- Total power: 1-0:16.7.0*255
- Phase power: 36.7 / 56.7 / 76.7
- Reads battery voltage and estimates SoC.
- Builds JSON payload, compresses, wraps in LoRa packet, transmits.
- Light sleeps between meter reads; batches are sent every 30s.
- Listens for LoRa time sync packets to set UTC clock.
- Uses DS3231 RTC after boot if no time sync has arrived yet.
- OLED shows status + meter data pages.
Sender flow (pseudo-code):
void sender_loop() {
meter_read_every_second(); // OBIS -> MeterData samples
read_battery(data); // VBAT + SoC
if (time_to_send_batch()) {
json = meterBatchToJson(samples, batch_id); // bat_v per batch, t_first/t_last included
compressed = compressBuffer(json);
lora_send(packet(MeterBatch, compressed));
}
display_set_last_meter(data);
display_set_last_read(ok);
display_set_last_tx(ok);
display_tick();
lora_receive_time_sync(); // optional
light_sleep_until_next_event();
}
Key sender functions:
bool meter_read(MeterData &data); // parse OBIS fields
void read_battery(MeterData &data); // ADC -> volts + percent
bool meterDataToJson(const MeterData&, String&);
bool compressBuffer(const uint8_t*, size_t, uint8_t*, size_t, size_t&);
bool lora_send(const LoraPacket &pkt); // add header + CRC16 and transmit
Receiver (USB-powered)
- WiFi STA connect using stored config; if not available/fails, starts AP.
- NTP sync (UTC) and local display in Europe/Berlin.
- Receives LoRa packets, verifies CRC16, decompresses, parses JSON.
- Publishes meter JSON to MQTT.
- Sends ACKs for MeterBatch packets and de-duplicates by batch_id.
- Web UI:
- AP mode: status + WiFi/MQTT config.
- STA mode: status + per-sender pages.
- OLED cycles through receiver status and per-sender pages (receiver OLED never sleeps).
Receiver loop (pseudo-code):
void receiver_loop() {
if (lora_receive(pkt)) {
if (pkt.type == MeterData) {
json = decompressBuffer(pkt.payload);
if (jsonToMeterData(json, data)) {
update_sender_status(data);
mqtt_publish_state(data);
}
} else if (pkt.type == MeterBatch) {
json = reassemble_and_decompress_batch(pkt);
for (sample in jsonToMeterBatch(json)) { // uses t_first/t_last for jittered timestamps
update_sender_status(sample);
mqtt_publish_state(sample);
}
}
}
if (time_to_send_timesync()) {
time_send_timesync(self_short_id); // 60s for first 10 min, then hourly if RTC is present
}
mqtt_loop();
web_server_loop();
display_set_receiver_status(...);
display_tick();
}
Key receiver functions:
bool lora_receive(LoraPacket &pkt, uint32_t timeout_ms);
bool jsonToMeterData(const String &json, MeterData &data);
bool jsonToMeterBatch(const String &json, MeterData *samples, size_t max, size_t &count);
bool mqtt_publish_state(const MeterData &data);
void web_server_loop(); // AP or STA UI
void time_send_timesync(uint16_t self_id);
Test Mode (compile-time)
Enabled by -DENABLE_TEST_MODE (see platformio.ini test environment).
- Sender: sends 4-digit test code every ~30s in JSON.
- Receiver: shows last test code per sender and publishes to
/testtopic. - Normal behavior is excluded from test builds.
Test sender (pseudo-code):
void test_sender_loop() {
code = random_4_digits();
json = {id, role:"sender", test_code: code, ts};
lora_send(packet(TestCode, compress(json)));
display_set_test_code(code);
}
Test receiver (pseudo-code):
void test_receiver_loop() {
if (pkt.type == TestCode) {
json = decompress(pkt.payload);
update_sender_test_code(json);
mqtt_publish_test(id, json);
}
}
LoRa Protocol
Packet layout:
[0] protocol_version (1)
[1] role (0=sender, 1=receiver)
[2..3] device_id_short (uint16)
[4] payload_type (0=meter, 1=test, 2=time_sync, 3=meter_batch, 4=ack)
[5..N-3] compressed payload
[N-2..N-1] CRC16 (bytes 0..N-3)
LoRa radio settings:
- Frequency: 433 MHz or 868 MHz (set by build env via
LORA_FREQUENCY_HZ) - SF10, BW 125 kHz, CR 4/5, CRC on, Sync Word 0x34
Data Format
JSON payload (sender + MQTT):
{
"id": "F19C",
"ts": 1737200000,
"e_kwh": 1234.57,
"p_w": 950.00,
"p1_w": 500.00,
"p2_w": 450.00,
"p3_w": 0.00,
"bat_v": 3.92,
"bat_pct": 78
}
MeterBatch JSON (compressed over LoRa) uses per-field arrays with integer units for easier ingestion:
{
"schema": 1,
"sender": "s01",
"batch_id": 1842,
"t0": 1738288000,
"t_first": 1738288000,
"t_last": 1738288030,
"dt_s": 1,
"n": 3,
"energy_wh": [123456700, 123456701, 123456701],
"p_w": [930, 940, 950],
"p1_w": [480, 490, 500],
"p2_w": [450, 450, 450],
"p3_w": [0, 0, 0],
"bat_v": 3.92,
"meta": {
"rssi": -92,
"snr": 7.5,
"rx_ts": 1738288031
}
}
Notes:
sendermaps toEXPECTED_SENDER_IDSorder (s01= first sender).metais injected by the receiver after batch reassembly.bat_vis a single batch-level value (percent is calculated locally).
Device IDs
- Derived from WiFi STA MAC.
short_id = (MAC[4] << 8) | MAC[5]device_id = dd3-%04X- JSON
iduses only the last 4 hex digits (e.g.,F19C) to save airtime.
Receiver expects known senders in include/config.h via:
constexpr uint8_t NUM_SENDERS = 1;
inline constexpr uint16_t EXPECTED_SENDER_IDS[NUM_SENDERS] = { 0xF19C };
OLED Behavior
- Sender: OLED stays ON for 10 seconds on each wake, then powers down for sleep.
- Receiver: OLED is always on (no auto-off).
- Pages rotate every 4s.
Power & Battery
- Sender disables WiFi/BLE, reads VBAT via ADC, uses linear SoC map:
- 3.0 V = 0%
- 4.2 V = 100%
- Uses deep sleep between cycles (
SENDER_WAKE_INTERVAL_SEC).
Web UI
- AP SSID:
DD3-Bridge-<short_id> - AP password:
changeme123 - Endpoints:
/: status overview/wifi: WiFi/MQTT/NTP config (AP and STA)/sender/<device_id>: per-sender details
MQTT
- Topic:
smartmeter/<deviceId>/state - QoS 0
- Test mode:
smartmeter/<deviceId>/test - Client ID:
dd3-bridge-<device_id>(stable, derived from MAC)
NTP
- NTP servers are configurable in the web UI (
/wifi). - Defaults:
pool.ntp.organdtime.nist.gov.
RTC (DS3231)
- Optional DS3231 on the I2C bus. Connect SDA to GPIO21 and SCL to GPIO22 (same bus as the OLED).
- Enable/disable with
ENABLE_DS3231ininclude/config.h. - Receiver time sync packets set the RTC.
- On boot, if no LoRa time sync has arrived yet, the sender uses the RTC time as the initial
ts_utc. - When no RTC is present or enabled, the receiver keeps sending time sync every 60 seconds.
Build Environments
lilygo-t3-v1-6-1: production buildlilygo-t3-v1-6-1-test: test build withENABLE_TEST_MODElilygo-t3-v1-6-1-868: production build for 868 MHz moduleslilygo-t3-v1-6-1-868-test: test build for 868 MHz modules
Config Knobs
Key timing settings in include/config.h:
METER_SAMPLE_INTERVAL_MSMETER_SEND_INTERVAL_MSBATCH_ACK_TIMEOUT_MSBATCH_MAX_RETRIESBATCH_QUEUE_DEPTHBATCH_RETRY_POLICY(keep or drop on retry exhaustion)SERIAL_DEBUG_MODE/SERIAL_DEBUG_DUMP_JSONLORA_SEND_BYPASS(debug only)
Limits & Known Constraints
- Compression: uses lightweight RLE (good for JSON but not optimal).
- OBIS parsing: supports IEC 62056-21 ASCII (Mode D); may need tuning for some meters.
- Payload size: single JSON frames < 256 bytes (ArduinoJson static doc); batch frames are chunked and reassembled.
- Battery ADC: uses simple linear calibration constant in
power_manager.cpp. - OLED: no hardware reset line is used (matches working reference).
- Batch ACKs: sender waits for ACK after a batch and retries up to
BATCH_MAX_RETRIESwithBATCH_ACK_TIMEOUT_MSbetween attempts.
Files & Modules
include/config.h,src/config.cpp: pins, radio settings, sender IDsinclude/data_model.h,src/data_model.cpp: MeterData + ID initinclude/json_codec.h,src/json_codec.cpp: JSON encode/decodeinclude/compressor.h,src/compressor.cpp: RLE compressioninclude/lora_transport.h,src/lora_transport.cpp: LoRa packet + CRCinclude/meter_driver.h,src/meter_driver.cpp: IEC 62056-21 ASCII parseinclude/power_manager.h,src/power_manager.cpp: ADC + sleepinclude/time_manager.h,src/time_manager.cpp: NTP + time syncinclude/wifi_manager.h,src/wifi_manager.cpp: NVS config + WiFiinclude/mqtt_client.h,src/mqtt_client.cpp: MQTT publishinclude/web_server.h,src/web_server.cpp: AP/STA web pagesinclude/display_ui.h,src/display_ui.cpp: OLED pages + controlinclude/test_mode.h,src/test_mode.cpp: test sender/receiversrc/main.cpp: role detection and main loop
Quick Start
- Set role jumper on GPIO13:
- LOW: sender
- HIGH: receiver
- OLED control on GPIO14:
- HIGH: always on
- LOW: auto-off after 10 minutes
- Build and upload:
pio run -e lilygo-t3-v1-6-1 -t upload --upload-port COMx
Test mode:
pio run -e lilygo-t3-v1-6-1-test -t upload --upload-port COMx
868 MHz builds:
pio run -e lilygo-t3-v1-6-1-868 -t upload --upload-port COMx
868 MHz test mode:
pio run -e lilygo-t3-v1-6-1-868-test -t upload --upload-port COMx