WiFi crashing / device freezing

[SmartyVan]

Device: WiCAN OBD
Firmware: 4.04
Config: sprinter config redacted.json
Vehicle: 2022 Mercedes Sprinter

Issue:
Every drive session the WiCAN OBD seems to crash or freeze. The Wifi light extinguishes and eventually the Messages (amber) LED extinguishes and I'm left with a solid blue power light on the device.

I have tried everything I can think of with wifi settings and restricting the device to a 2.4Ghz-only network.

Any thoughts here based on my config or otherwise??

[richl007]

I'm also having a freezing issue, when I'm on a long drive, every hour it seems to freeze up and then reboot. So it's offline for about 3 minutes every hour.

[gerhardvilsecker]

I had even worse problems: My adapter did not properly reboot after config change. No ligth at all. No Wifi AP. But Ali helped me to bring the device online again. I opened the cover and flashed the device using ESP flash tool (yes even the OBD version of wican has an external USB port :-) ). Since I flashed with 4.04 I had no problems any more. However I have not done any longer trips since that time....
@meatpiHQ: thanks again for that extraordinary support

[meatpiHQ]

I think this might be a memory leak. I'm on holiday until the end of next week, I'll have a look when I'm back.

[meatpiHQ]

@richl007

I'm also having a freezing issue, when I'm on a long drive, every hour it seems to freeze up and then reboot. So it's offline for about 3 minutes every hour.

Yes looks like it's the same issue as #331

[typxxi]

Similiar issue here too reported for the e-GOLF based on firmware 2.98

I can not determine why or when it will be caused. I can only recognice that if the HA values seems to be off.
If I go to the car and check the odometer, range and what not I can turn on the ignition and then golf data should appear via mqtt in HA, but in those cases not.

I have cross checked that behaviour with my phone (HA App) and tablet (chrome browser) if the data are updated inside HA or not.

In case they have not been updated I can turn on and off the ignition as long as I want but nothing will be updated

UNTIL I unplug the Meatpi OBD dongle and then plug it back in. Within seconds the data will appear on both devices.
So something must be wrong. What I have also recogniced: the WLAN chip itself must be working still fine cause my HA has a routine checking if the device is online or not. And it still shows online. If I drive away (out of WLAN range) then the status will change to offline.

Maybe the same issue - I have not updated the firmware cause I am not sure if that would work once I had done the update or if I have to do the settings again.

[SmartyVan]

@meatpiHQ have you had a chance to investigate this. I have not been able to mitigate. It feels like a wifi issue. Sometimes the messages light keeps flashing. And sometimes it even seem to recover after it sleeps and wakes up again.

[meatpiHQ]

@SmartyVan sorry for the delay, I'm still catching up on the issues.

The green LED indicates the MQTT connection status. When it's off, it means MQTT is disconnected. Can you check if the device is still connected to the Wi-Fi network by pinging it when this happens? It might be still connected to Wi-Fi but not MQTT.

I started testing here by logging the output, and I haven't seen the same issue so far. I should probably let it run for a longer time. I can send a firmware with log output enabled, are you able to log the output through a USB cable?

[typxxi]

i have a similiar issue and I could check only remotely if for example mqtt was not running properly or HA had caused an issue but that is not the case. It must be a Dongle issue .
Right now I do not have the car and can not check it but I guess tomorrow the car will be back and I will be home to check the 3 LED .

So far it had only worked once I have unplugged it (e-GOLF 2020).

[SmartyVan]

@SmartyVan sorry for the delay, I'm still catching up on the issues.

The green LED indicates the MQTT connection status. When it's off, it means MQTT is disconnected. Can you check if the device is still connected to the Wi-Fi network by pinging it when this happens? It might be still connected to Wi-Fi but not MQTT.

I started testing here by logging the output, and I haven't seen the same issue so far. I should probably let it run for a longer time. I can send a firmware with log output enabled, are you able to log the output through a USB cable?

I could set up USB logging if you give me the steps!

Also potentially of note, and I need to validate this further, but it seems I usually get a status message updated to {"status": "offline"}

[meatpiHQ]

@SmartyVan

Also potentially of note, and I need to validate this further, but it seems I usually get a status message updated to {"status": "offline"}

The offline message is not sent by the device, this is the MQTT Last Will message sent by the broker when the device disconnects from MQTT.

Here's how to log the debug output.

1- Update the firmware wican-fw_obd_v404a.zip
2- Plug in a Micro USB cable into WiCAN, and it will enumerate as USB to serial device
3- Use PuTTY to log the serial output.

[meatpiHQ]

Hey @SmartyVan any luck with the logs?

[SmartyVan]

@meatpiHQ On the list, but not yet. Thanks for checking in. And duh re: last will message—of course! Makes sense.