Mounting wireless outside in cold temps

[Jeffl]

Is there anything to worry about in mounting my wireless transmitter outside in cold temps (-30F) ?  I plan to mount both the wireless enclosure and walwart inside an outer plastic enclosure (similar to an LE case) and screw it to the house somewhere as my coverage is spotty if the wireless unit is indoors.

[tbone321]

-30F is pretty cold.  RJ has done a lot to make the equipment he designes capable of dealing with cold weather so you should be ok but since he is in Florida, I doubt that he can truly test at temps that cold.  If you are going to mount the wireless transmitter and its walwart in a seperate container anyway, then I would also add in a few wired in C9 sockets inside of the case as well.  This way if the controller is being affected by the cold you could screw in one or more C9 bulbs to provide some heat to warm up the transmitter.

[Jeffl]

-30 is the worst case and probably would not happen during show times.  A C9 is a good idea.  I'm just looking for ways to house the whole setup outside and I don't think the wireless case is waterproof enough to house outside by  itself.

[JJJR]

Perhaps I'm wrong but I know in the computing world the idea is to run as cool as possbile.
PC "overclockers" will contastly try to get the cpu as cold as possible so that it can be clocked to a higher speed where normally the byproduct of heat would have destroyed the system.
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login is a video of AMD engineers showing liquid nitrogen cooling at a convention. They took the processor down to -170C or -274F!
If you look around you'll find videos of liquid nitrogen units failing on these extremely overclocked machines and when it does its like a small bomb went off in the computer case as the cpu instantly overheats and literaly explodes.

I would think the wireless unit would operate with out issues at cold temps as long as the case your putting it in is sealed from the elements well.

I'm sure RJ can confirm this when he gets back from his vacation. I do know he runs numerous tests on his equipment prior to releasing them.

[Jeffl]

Most of the components have and operating temperature band.  From what I know RJ has been careful this year to choose parts that operate down to -40c so there shouldn't be any problems.

[PJNMCT]

-30 is the worst case and probably would not happen during show times.  A C9 is a good idea.  I'm just looking for ways to house the whole setup outside and I don't think the wireless case is waterproof enough to house outside by  itself.

...don't know if this helps, but I had my v1 wireless outside the whole season last year with no water problems in the Florida rains!

-Paul

[Kwajtony]

You can verify the wireless operation at that temperature by checking the operating temperature of the individual components.  Most of the time the temp is given in C so you might need to convert.  I believe last winter the 3.3V regulator had an issue until RJ changed it out.

R,
Tony "C"

[RJ]

I try to be really careful of this because I missed a part once that caused some problems for my cold weather friends. The best I can do for testing is this. I put ice in plastic bags, fill them with alcohol and salt and put them in the freezer packed around the device sort of like making ice cream but more so with the alcohol. I am able to get stuff pretty cold this way. I think you will be alright with the Wireless.

The only time I use a part that is not rated at -40c or better is if no such part is avaliable. This is rare but some items can not be built to work that cold. If you look up the part on the bom list and pull each of their data sheets up you should find the temp range of the part.

RJ 

[batdive]

. I put ice in plastic bags, fill them with alcohol and salt and put them in the freezer

Hmm can I have my TX margarita shaken not stirred please?   

[riri7707]

There are 2 rules to take care about using outside devices :
1st one is the air condenser who transforms the air in water and if your enclosures are too waterproof, you will find water inside at end and moisture on your soldering points.

Too big temperature difference when you switch ON can damage and destroy the boards too, due to the mechanical movement of the metal, plastics,etc...

To prevent that, generally the PCBs must to be covered by flexible plastic resin (small skin), who will protect the electronics from moisture, water condensation, and potential dry contacts on soldering points.
You can easy find liquid resin for waterproof...
Then the enclosures needs to be warmed too using external resistors, light bulbs, heaters...,  with a thermostat to switch on and off, depending of  the temperature range you want to warm...
This will safe your goodies from weather surprises...

It will be interesting to have such schematics on the forum to help other users...
Personally, i used the same resistors and thermostat switch we can find on CCTV enclosures (outdoor cams and PTZ enclosures)

Cheers.... Henri

[wbuehler]

I had my version 1 mounted in a tree last year, with no problems.

Bill