One of the functions for my RV monitoring project includes a “power pole” monitor. It would monitor the temperature of the actual power plug. (we had one burn up before, and the plug on the side of the RV too!).
So, the plan is to use a suitable battery (enough power for about two “cloudy days”, a solar panel that would keep said battery charged, and a XIAO ESP32-C3 that reads a DS18B20 temperature sensor and then transmits that back to another inside unit (via ESP-NOW), then goes to sleep. Starts over on wake after about 5 minutes.
So far, the sleep and everything is working just fine.
But now I’m not so sure about the optimum place to put power.
I have a solar panel, supplies nothing but power. A battery. And a solar charger. This one from Adafruit (or one similar) ADA390, and another very similar (Aideepen MCP73871).
The question is, I guess, is where would you power the XAIO board? Tap off the battery, onto the “battery” terminals on the XAIO board? Or just connect the battery (after the solar charger) to the “power” (5V) terminals on the XIAO board? Apply “power” to the XIAO board, and the battery to the battery connection?
I’m not sure if the XIAO board has an actual battery charger, an if that charger circuit would have a problem with the solar charger. I don’t want them fighting each other.