Uploading OptiSmart 'dAtA' channel to COSM help

13 June, 2012 - 15:45

#1

andy

Offline

United Kingdom

Joined: 17 Mar 2012

Hi, Without you pasting your

Hi,

Without you pasting your pachube settings its a little hard to tell, but maybe the following can help:

xAP source for whole house should be: dbzoo.livebox.CurrentCost:ch.1

whereas a sensor (one of the other channels) would be dbzoo.livebox.CurrentCost:sensor.<n> where n is 1-? e.g dbzoo.livebox.CurrentCost:sensor.1

You are generally trapping latest value changes, so class should be xAPBSC.event, and its an input.state for xAP section and its the 'text' attribute to get the value.

You MUST have set the ID up in your feed already and it must be writeable.

You may not see data for a few mins, so wait a while before checking your graphs in cosm.

--andy

14 June, 2012 - 09:20

#2

jetjackson

Offline

Winchester, United Kingdom

Joined: 18 May 2012

OK.. settings attached. I've

OK.. settings attached. I've included the CurrectCost tab, the Pachube tab, and a view in COSM.

At the moment I have an EnviR (v1.29) connected via a data cable to the HAH. Paired to the EnviR is a 'small' clamp on the main 'whole house' channel (Ch1). This is on the live going in to the generation meter, so its recording generation from my PV panels and consumption of the inverter.

I have an OptiSmart connected to the generation meter. Its this I want to get into COSM.

In the past, I have had it paired as on an appliance channel, but just as a normal sensor, so it posts real-time data. I got this working but looking at the values it was sending, and comparing to the generation meter readings day to day is was waaaaaaaay off. I contacted CurrentCost about this and they said that the real time data for the OptiSmart is not accurate, and to get the accurate 'pulse' data from the OptiSmart it must be paired in 'DATA' mode.

I've re-paired on Ch9 as the instructions suggest, and have tried again on Ch1, but get nothing. So I've been looking through examples I can find in here to see if I can work out how to set up the box.

What I've realised is that I don't really understand what I'm doing...!

So, on the CurrentCost tab, I think that I have it set up right to recover the values from a sensor. As the numbers start at 1, I assume that if there is nothing in this page it will still upload the temp on Ch0 and main house power on Ch1. So, each of the sensors, 1 - 9 refer to the appliance channels 1 - 9? If so, I have (based on what I have seen elsewhere) added values that *should* allow data to be recoverd from the OptiSmart paired on Appliance 1.

On the Pachube tab, I've them asked this to be pushed into Ch9 of my feed.

- Does it all look OK?

- Does anything need to be different to collect the data from the OptiSmart paired as 'dAtA' rather than real-time consumption?

All help gratefully received!

Attachment	Size
CurrentCostTab.PNG	85.08 KB
PachubeTab.PNG	106.61 KB
Cosm.PNG	102.82 KB

14 June, 2012 - 09:42

#3

derek

Offline

Glasgow, United Kingdom

Joined: 26 Oct 2009

Check the xAP traffic

If you use xfXViewer (or xap-snoop on the HAH), do you see the messages containing the info from your EnviR unit?

Derek

14 June, 2012 - 09:59

#4

jetjackson

Offline

Winchester, United Kingdom

Joined: 18 May 2012

I've been using xAP in the

I've been using xAP in the ipad / iphone (its free). I can see traffic from Ch0 and Ch1, but with the setting I have at the moment nothing from sensor.anything.

14 June, 2012 - 10:34

#5

derek

Offline

Glasgow, United Kingdom

Joined: 26 Oct 2009

Strange

I've got a CC IAM configured as sensor 2.

using xap-snoop, I see:

xap-header

{
v=12
hop=1
uid=FF00DC0E
class=xAPBSC.info
source=dbzoo.livebox.CurrentCost:sensor.2
}

input.state
{
state=on
text=2
displaytext=2 Watts
}

Your CC sensor configuration on the HAH looks to be the same as mine, you really just need to make sure that it's an analogue channel.

Did you try following the troubleshooting notes at http://www.dbzoo.com/livebox/xap_currentcost#troubleshooting

Perhaps inspect the XML feed and see if the 'sensor' data is actuall being sent.

Derek.

15 June, 2012 - 20:51

#6

jetjackson

Offline

Winchester, United Kingdom

Joined: 18 May 2012

OK.. its the way its paired.

OK.. its the way its paired. I did a couple of experiments this evening. I've changed non of the settings on the HAH I've posted previously. I re-paired the OptiSmart to the EnviR on Appliance 1 as a real-time sensor (i.e. not id 'dAtA' mode), disabled and re-enabled the CC funtion via the web interface and sensor.1 appeared on xAP straight away. The data is now quite happily being posted to COSM here (Ch9) : https://cosm.com/feeds/7216

So it appears the HAH can't read data from the OptiSmart when its paired in data mode, only in real time mode. CC told me that (via the bridge) the real time mode is not accurate. I can confirm this. I tracked this over a week using the CC dashboard and the daily totals can vary by as much as 50%.

So will the OptiSmart be any more accurate via the HAH? I wonder why its so inaccurate. Is it the old problem of the 6 min average that CC apply?

I've set my pachube update at 10 second interval and I will track what ends up in COSM, PVouput and on the generation meter and report back.

All I want it a accurate record... surely it shouldnt be this hard!

20 June, 2012 - 05:23

#7

DoubleSpeed

Offline

Bristol, United Kingdom

Joined: 31 Mar 2012

I've found that my CC

I've found that my CC readings are not accurate as well I use the clamps and they really aren't that accurate I've fixed this (within a few percent) using custom rules applied to my PV Output account which adds or subtracts a percentage based on wattage bands and now my readings match my end of day meter generation totalas said within a few percent

20 June, 2012 - 07:36

#8

jetjackson

Offline

Winchester, United Kingdom

Joined: 18 May 2012

Yes... But the clamp will

Yes... But the clamp will always be uncertain. I've been experimenting for a few days this week. I've added an 8mm clamp to the live into my generation meter and put this on the consumption channel of PVoutput, just so I could easily overlay the generation view from the Optismart pulses with the generation from the clamp.

The main 'problem' with the clamp, the general inaccuracy and voltage variation aside, is that is cant tell the difference in direction, so when the panel output drops below a certain level and the inverter is using more than they generate the flow is reversed. You can clearly see this on the red line.

I'm currently running with a 10 second interval on the HAH and a 5 min interval on PVOutput. Yesterday the value was spot on.

As an aside, I'm also uploading from the clamp via another envi and the bridge. So here are the figures :

Visial check on generation meter : 14.9 kWh

OptiSmart > EnviR > HAH > COSM > PVOutput : 14.9

Clamp > Envi R > HAH > COSM > PVOutput : 15.9 (includes inverter consumption)

Clamp > Envi > CCBridge > COSM > CC Dashboard : 16.3

Interesting that the CCBridge reading (with a 6 min average) is higher.

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clamp_and_optismart.jpg	47.46 KB

29 June, 2012 - 22:07

#9

g7pkf

Offline

United Kingdom

Joined: 11 Jan 2011

current cost is a home usage item

I do think if you want accuracy to be within 1% you are not going to get it with current cost device.

you will get it with an item costing 10X the cost.

current cost is an excellent device for "indication" and it is pretty good but to expect it to be 99% accurate is being hopeful.

sorry if this sounds a rant its not meant to be but you get what you pay for.

Dean

1 July, 2012 - 12:33

#10

jetjackson

Offline

Winchester, United Kingdom

Joined: 18 May 2012

I totally understand what you

I totally understand what you are saying, but it's not the accuracy that bothers me. +\- a percentage would be fine. For me the issue is reliability and poor support. The reason I have come down the HAH path is because the bridge product is so unreliable. It has fundamental issues that CC simply aren't addressing.

That aside, the OptiSmart is a product that is designed to read meter pulses to improve accuracy. There is no reason for it not to be 100% (give or take) accurate. All it has to do is count the pulses in a given time and push the data on to COSM. The thing is have exchanged about 20 support emails with them, I'm not convinced there support guys actually know how it works. I'm now happy that with a 10 second upload from the HAH to COSM and a 5 min interal on pvoutput I'm getting accuracy within a few percent.

Im also still trim to push the same data via my bridge to CC, the thing is the still haven't told me how to get it to work. The latest sugtestion is that I must upgrade to a multi channel bridge, even if I'm only pushing 1 channel of the OptiSmart XML data to them. I've challenged this but haven't got a decen answer yet.

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Uploading OptiSmart 'dAtA' channel to COSM help