No GPS data

[xe2ad]

Hi,
My Tbeam is not getting the position information from GPS, so no position is transmitted. The Tbeam's version is V1.1 with NEO-6M module. I had turned on the tracker all the night expecting to get position info without success.

[wolfpcgn]

Maybe this can help you: https://github.com/eriktheV-king/TTGO_T-beam_GPS-reset
If the red LED nearby the GPS-module doesn't flash, look at the GPS-antenna its cable or its connector. If you choose the wrong T-BEAM version (0.7 instead of 1.0) there might be no power-supply for the GPS-module.

[xe2ad]

Thanks for your reply, seems that I was able to run the GPS reset properly, watching the monitor... but still can't get any GPS info. I put the tbeam board in my window, all night without any success (yesterday afternoon it got the date but no position info and the GPS led has been turned off).

[ccmolik]

For what it's worth, I saw similar behavior with the V1.1 and was convinced the GPS was faulty. It wasn't.

The antenna does seem to be kind of weak, though, and I often find I need to place the device outside with a view of the sky to have it pick up a signal. Being in a window didn't cut it.

This could be coincidental timing but after I added an 18650 battery, the device seemed to keep track of the GPS signal better in my tests, even in a car (red LED blinking next to the GPS chip, etc).

I ended up making a change to the code to have it print the GPS sentences to the console (via the 'Upload and Monitor' feature in PlatformIO):

@@ -118,13 +120,13 @@ void loop() {
   if (Config.debug) {
     while (Serial.available() > 0) {
       char c = Serial.read();
-      // Serial.print(c);
+      Serial.print(c);
       gps.encode(c);
     }
   } else {
     while (ss.available() > 0) {
       char c = ss.read();
-      // Serial.print(c);
+      Serial.print(c);
       gps.encode(c);
     }
   }

I'd then get the $GPGSV sentences in the console, where I could look at the fourth field to see the number of satellites it saw, even if it's not actually using them until $GPGGA fields get populated. This takes a bit as the GPS chip seems to need time to start accepting the satellites it sees.

[xe2ad]

@wolfpcgn @ccmolik Hi fellows... problem solved. The issue was the GPS antenna. I changed the ceramic antenna and replaced it with an external one and it started to work.
Thanks for your help !
Best regards,
-David, XE2AD.