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Campbell RF500M Instruction Manual Download Page 17

Section 3.  Assembling the Radiotelemetry Network 

4.

 

Baud Rate – Set the baud rate for the RS-232 interface. 

5.

 

Sleep-Mode Enabled – Determine if sleep mode functionality will be 
enabled for RF300 series radios.  In all other cases, this setting will be 
ignored. 

Once the RF500M has been configured, it is ready to be deployed. 

3.2.2  Install Base Station 

When the RF500M is used in a base station configuration, the PC is attached to 
the RS-232 port with a null modem cable.  If a digital radio is being used on 
the RS-232 port, the CS I/O port can be configured to communicate with the 
PC but an SC532(A) and serial cable must be used between the PC and the CS 
I/O port of the RF500M. 

1.  Connect the RF500M to 12 V and ground.  Connect the radio to 12 V, 

ground, and the RF Modem (RF500M). 

Radio transmission without an antenna connected can 
damage the radio. 

CAUTION 

2.

 

Mount the base station antenna in a location that is higher than any 
surrounding buildings or obstacles.  Refer to Section 2.3 for more 
information on mounting the antenna. 

3.

 

After the antenna is mounted, connect the coax cable between the antenna 
and radio. 

4.

 

Connect a large gauge (approximately 8 AWG) copper wire from the 
antenna to a good earth ground.  This is for lightning protection.  This is 
required for any antenna, especially if the coax cable from the antenna 
goes inside a building. 

5.

 

Connect a null modem cable from the computer serial port to the RS-232 
port of the RF500M.  If a digital radio is being used on the RS-232 port, 
an SC532 and serial cable can be used between the PC and the CS I/O port 
of the RF500M.  Set the appropriate configuration options in the RF500M 
with Device Configuration Utility depending on the port connected to the 
PC. 

3.2.3  Install Nearest Repeater/Field Station 

Now install the nearest field station.  If it communicates with the base station 
via a repeater, the repeater station must also be installed. Make sure the correct 
RF ID has been configured in the RF500M that is being deployed in the remote 
field station or repeater location. 

3-3 

Summary of Contents for RF500M

Page 1: ...RF500M Radio Modem Revision 8 10 C o p y r i g h t 2 0 0 8 2 0 1 0 C a m p b e l l S c i e n t i f i c I n c ...

Page 2: ...ustomers residing in countries served by Campbell Scientific Inc directly Affiliate companies handle repairs for customers within their territories Please visit www campbellsci com to determine which Campbell Scientific company serves your country To obtain a Returned Materials Authorization RMA contact Campbell Scientific Inc phone 435 753 2342 After an applications engineer determines the nature...

Page 3: ...ion 3 2 2 3 Digital Radio Description 5 2 3 Antennas and Cables 5 2 3 1 Antenna Mounts 5 2 3 2 Antenna Orientation 5 2 3 3 Antenna Cables and Connectors 6 2 4 Tripods Towers Enclosures and Power Supplies 8 2 4 1 Tripods and Towers for Mounting 8 2 4 2 Enclosures 8 2 4 3 Power Supply 8 2 4 3 1 Lead Acid Batteries 8 3 Assembling the Radiotelemetry Network 3 1 3 1 Final Layout 1 3 2 Configure the RF5...

Page 4: ...als of Radiotelemetry A 1 A 1 Radio Waves 1 A 2 Antennas 2 A 3 RF500M Modem 2 A 4 Transceiver 3 Appendix B Power Calculations B 1 Glossary Figures 2 1 RF500M Modem 2 1 2 2 RF500M Radio Jumper Location 2 4 2 3 RF500M Radio Jumper Expanded View 2 5 2 4 The PD237 Crossover Plate Antenna Mount 2 6 2 5 The PD46 Clamp Mount 2 7 2 6 Type NM male BNC and Type NF female Connectors 2 7 4 1 LoggerNet Main To...

Page 5: ... include The distance between radio stations should not be greater than approximately 25 miles The stations should not have major obstacles between them therefore they should be within line of sight of each other Telemetry network s three basic components are Field Station Base Station Repeater Station This manual covers the use of the RF500M Modem Some LoggerNet software topics are also addressed...

Page 6: ... the base station Equipment Required Radio RF Base Station Computer with LoggerNet software Antenna and antenna cable AC power 1 4 Repeater Purpose To act as relay between two communicating stations separated by too long of a distance or an obstacle which impedes direct communication A repeater is not always required in an RF telemetry network A field station can also function as a repeater Equipm...

Page 7: ...on stations The RF500M is an RF modem LoggerNet will refer to the RF500M as an RFBase TD or RFRemote PB 2 1 1 Physical Description There are three ports for interfacing external devices on the front of the RF500M The port labeled Transceiver connects to the radio RF310 series RF300 series or DataRadio DL 3400 the port labeled CS I O connects to either the datalogger or to the PC as an RF Base and ...

Page 8: ... or 11 or in the PC to RF base state The RS 232 port can be used in either the PC to RF base state the RS 232 digital radio connection state or the RF500M to datalogger state The proper state must be determined and configured before deploying the RF500M in the field Device Configuration Utility is used to change and apply the settings for the RF500M 2 1 3 Setting the RF Address Each RF500M includi...

Page 9: ...t the RS 232 port of the RF500M to the PC The 10 pin rectangular connector is for connection to the transceiver interface TABLE 2 1 RF500M CS I O to Datalogger Connector Description Pin Description 1 5 V Not Used 2 GND Ground 3 Ring Ring to Datalogger 4 RXD Transmit from RF500M 5 ME Modem Enable from Datalogger 6 SDE Synchronous Device Enable 7 CLK HS Clock Handshake from Datalogger 8 12V Supply f...

Page 10: ...he board When looking at the front panel with the three ports the jumpers that need to be set are located in the back right corner of the circuit board The two jumpers next to the edge of the circuit board should be selected if using the RF310 series radios The two jumpers in the center should be selected if using the RF300 series radios The two jumpers on the inside of the board should be selecte...

Page 11: ...ntennas radiate and receive the radio signals Each radio in an RF telemetry system must have an antenna Coaxial cable is used to connect the antenna to the radio 2 3 1 Antenna Mounts Antennas must be mounted above any surrounding buildings or obstacles Antennas must be properly oriented in relationship to the other antennas for RF communications to work Antennas have various mounting options Speci...

Page 12: ...tors The most common cable type to connect a radio to the antenna is a coaxial RG 8A U cable Two connectors are required for each length of cable The connector for the radio is a BNC type connector The connector for the antenna is usually either a Type NM or Type NF The BNC Type NM and Type NF connectors are shown in Figure 2 6 The Type NM male connector is for antennas with a female receptacle an...

Page 13: ...ni UHF Coax NM L Unity 1 2 1 4 U Bolts BA6110 Omni UHF Coax NM L Unity 3 4 2 1 8 U Bolts BA6312 Omni UHF Coax NM L 3 0 1 2 1 4 U Bolts PD200 Omni VHF Coax NF L 5 8 1 2 3 4 PD46 Fig 2 5 PD201 Omni UHF Coax NF L 5 0 1 2 3 4 PD46 Fig 2 5 PD220 Omni VHF Coax NF L 5 25 1 2 3 4 PD46 Fig 2 5 PD344 Dipole VHF Coax NF L 4 5 2 1 2 Clamps PD390S Yagi VHF Coax NF L 8 0 1 5 16 2 1 4 or 2 3 8 PD37 Fig 2 4 PD400...

Page 14: ...ated at the bottom of the enclosure for routing cables and wires The enclosure door can be fastened with the clasp for easy access The enclosure s clasp door can be secured with a basic lock Both enclosures are white for reflecting solar radiation reducing the internal temperature The model ENC12 14 fiberglass enclosure has inside dimensions of 14 x 12 x 5 5 the model ENC14 16 fiberglass enclosure...

Page 15: ...he line of sight requirement A station may need to be moved or a repeater station may need to be added if this requirement is not met At each station there is an RF modem Each modem requires a unique ID number RF ID A valid RF ID is a number with the range of 1 to 255 On the map label the base station and the remaining stations with different ID numbers Later each modem will be set with the corres...

Page 16: ...e CS I O interface options Choose the SDC address that will be used to communicate with the datalogger or if a digital radio is attached and this RF500M is used as an RF Base select the Connected to PC via SC532 option requires an SC532 A between the CS I O interface and the serial port of the PC If using the Connected to PC via SC532 option make sure the RS 232 interface is not set as Connected t...

Page 17: ...n any surrounding buildings or obstacles Refer to Section 2 3 for more information on mounting the antenna 3 After the antenna is mounted connect the coax cable between the antenna and radio 4 Connect a large gauge approximately 8 AWG copper wire from the antenna to a good earth ground This is for lightning protection This is required for any antenna especially if the coax cable from the antenna g...

Page 18: ...erNet using the Setup screen include 1 Select appropriate communications port COM Port 2 Attach an RFBase TD to COM Port 3 Attach an RFRemote PB to the RFBase TD 4 Attach the PakBus datalogger to the RFRemote PB The default COM port settings should not be changed The RF Base default settings do not need to be changed The RF Remote default settings do not need to be changed other than specifying th...

Page 19: ... Physical Link Between Base and Field Station When communication fails troubleshooting begins with the simplest RF link in the system which is usually communication with the nearest field station There is NO substitute for first checking the hardware connections RF IDs and everything listed in the previous section Below are a few additional items to check 1 Antenna is used in proximity of metal 2 ...

Page 20: ...Section 3 Assembling the Radiotelemetry Network 3 6 ...

Page 21: ... and data collection methods 4 1 1 Basic Concepts LoggerNet is designed to use a unique communication path for each datalogger field site The Setup screen of LoggerNet allows the setup and shows the communication path used to communicate to each field station A typical RF communication path will start with the COM port usually listed as ComPort The next item in the typical communication path is th...

Page 22: ...all each station based on time In the Setup screen of LoggerNet highlight the datalogger of interest in the network map If the device map does not have the datalogger listed you must setup the datalogger including the correct RF path Using the Schedule tab check the Scheduled Collection Enabled checkbox set the base time of collection set your Collection Interval Primary Retry Interval Number of P...

Page 23: ...in the Setup screen To communicate with the datalogger open the Connect screen and click on the button that corresponds with the type of communication needed The Collect Now or Custom buttons will collect data from the datalogger The Send and Receive buttons will send a program to the datalogger or receive a program from the datalogger respectively The Check Clocks and Set Station Clock buttons wi...

Page 24: ...on in a PakBus Datalogger such as the CR800 CR1000 or CR3000 to send data records to LoggerNet With standard scheduled data collection the LoggerNet server requests specific records from each datalogger on a given interval Although this collection process works well over an RF telemetry network dialing each RF Remote to request records and collect data from each datalogger can take a considerable ...

Page 25: ...F Remote using the SendData instruction and these records are waiting in the buffer of the RF Remote when the polling process begins During the polling process records in the RF Remote buffer are sent from the RF Remote to the RF base Since each RF Remote has an assigned polling event time window in which the data is sent collisions and RF interference during data collection are avoided The RF bas...

Page 26: ...record number collected by LoggerNet were 100 LoggerNet would expect the next record number to be 101 However if the next record collected by LoggerNet were 105 LoggerNet would detect a hole in the collected data for the missing records 101 through 104 To automatically collect missing records and maintain a complete historical data collection in LoggerNet check the box to Enable Automatic Hole Col...

Page 27: ...ave nor sky wave is used in Campbell Scientific s RF networks Energy is lost from radio waves as they travel away from the transmitting antenna One reason for this is the loss due to dispersion of energy over a larger area analogous to water waves reducing in size energy as they get farther from the source Second is that energy is absorbed by the earth over the distance of travel Eddy currents cut...

Page 28: ...cle surrounding the antenna The horizontal pattern is important to consider when a RF station is to communicate with more than one other RF station The vertical pattern is the radiating pattern in the upward and downward directions Any two communicating RF stations must have a minimum level of signal power Power is normally expressed in decibels dB or decibel milliwatts dBm Power is lost through t...

Page 29: ...or by a crystal The electronics or crystal oscillates at a desired frequency which is specific for the carrier frequency The oscillator converts DC power to an AC signal This signal is then amplified modulated with the signal and transmitted to the antenna system The receiver consists of an amplifier frequency converter to slow signal limiter to give constant amplitude but same frequency and discr...

Page 30: ...Appendix A Fundamentals of Radiotelemetry A 4 ...

Page 31: ...ately 0 0000000000003 Watts 3X10 13 which represents 95 dBm Signal Power SP TP AG PL CL where SP Signal Power dBm Power of the signal received TP Transmit Power dBm Rated output power of transmitting radio PL Path Loss dB Power lost over the distance of communication calculated below AG Antenna Gain dB Total power gained by both the transmit and receive antennas and CL Coax Loss dB Total power los...

Page 32: ...Appendix B Power Calculations B 2 Power Conversion Conversion of Watts to dBm can be done with the following formula dBm 10 Log Watts 0 001 ...

Page 33: ...Decibel A unit of power equal to 10 times the common logarithm of the ratio of two amounts of signal power End of Link Modem An RF modem which is at the field station Field Station The place of origin of the data from which the data is then transmitted by radiotelemetry Forward Power Energy that is transmitted from a radio through coaxial cable and through the antenna without being reflected back ...

Page 34: ...d in specifying the RF path RF Modem Device which modulates an electrical signal on the carrier wave and codes all transmissions for a specific path RF Path The designation of an RF link with modem ID Numbers and modem commands Signal Power Power of a signal at the receiving radio after power is lost through transmission Start of Link Modem The modem located at the base station Squelch Setting on ...

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Page 36: ...rp CSC 11564 149th Street NW Edmonton Alberta T5M 1W7 CANADA www campbellsci ca dataloggers campbellsci ca Campbell Scientific Centro Caribe S A CSCC 300 N Cementerio Edificio Breller Santo Domingo Heredia 40305 COSTA RICA www campbellsci cc info campbellsci cc Campbell Scientific Ltd CSL Campbell Park 80 Hathern Road Shepshed Loughborough LE12 9GX UNITED KINGDOM www campbellsci co uk sales campbe...

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