nitrousnrg
commented
2 months ago https://github.com/espressif/esp-idf/issues/5044
Might be useful info.
So basically it takes this guy 32ms to init-transmit-deinit. That way the rest of the time the radio is turned off, and you can even put the whole ESP32 to sleep.
32ms using a baremetal C code... I don't expect lisp to be that fast.
We are currently sending throttle data very fast, every 20msec. If we relaxed this to 100ms (10Hz), then for 2/3 of the time the ESP can go to sleep. I guess that would cut power by 50%. If we prove that this actuslly works, the throttle transmit frequency should be easy to change in case users request a sharper throttle response.
We have packets coming from the skate to the remote at very low rate, like 1 every second. We can relax this even more, but we still need a way to sinchronize the remote for that packet reception. I propose a new packet sent every 10 seconds, such that the remote requests skate info and keeps the radio powered until the receiver sends the data.
With the WIFI off the remote had a current draw of only ~30mA, but when the ESPNOW radio is turned ON, the current consumption increases to 100mA.
This reduces the battery runtime to 4 hours or less.
We should aim at 10+ hours of runtime, so let's see if there is a way to optimize this, either by decreasing transmit power or by turning off the radio when not in use.