PHOA Water Meter System.
Mesh hub · FW 0.1.36

Water Meter Gateway

The Gateway is the seam between the radio mesh and the IP network. It listens on 433 MHz for readings forwarded by Node devices, holds them in a local queue, and POSTs them as JSON to a Windows ingest service running elsewhere on the LAN. If that service is offline, the queue keeps growing until it comes back — no data is dropped.

It also runs the management plane: a client roster of every Node it's heard from, daily "By Node" usage emails, and a small command surface for poking nodes remotely — set a default meter, clear a database, ping for connectivity, reboot.

Water Meter Gateway dashboard at 192.168.0.102: ingest healthy at HTTP 200, queue empty, 5 active mesh clients with RSSI, LQI, packet counts and last-seen timestamps.
live: 192.168.0.102 · 5 clients · 317 readings sent to PC ingest

What it does, in plain English

A Node decodes a meter and sends a packet to the Gateway over the 433 MHz CC1101 mesh. The Gateway receives it, adds it to a per-meter ledger (so it can compute interval flow rates even when meters don't report flow themselves), and queues it for upload. A background task drains the queue by POSTing batched JSON to a FastAPI ingest service on the local PC at port 41290, which writes the readings into MySQL.

If the PC is rebooting, on a different network, or just busy, the gateway keeps the queue and retries. The dashboard shows the queue depth, last HTTP response code, and a running drop counter so you can see at a glance whether the pipe is healthy.

Key features

  • CC1101 mesh hub. Receives readings and events from up to 32 nodes over a 433 MHz 2-FSK mesh, with multi-hop relay and ACKs. Auto-tracks a client roster — chip, firmware version, RSSI, LQI, last-seen.
  • HTTP ingest with retry buffer. Batches readings and events into JSON payloads and POSTs them to a FastAPI endpoint at http://<pc-ip>:41290/ingest. Buffers locally when the PC is offline and drains on reconnect — no readings are lost.
  • Optional W5500 Ethernet. Compile with #define HAVE_W5500 to use a wired uplink on the SPI bus (CS=5, RST=22). Falls back to WiFi if the link is down.
  • Fallback WiFi AP. Always broadcasts a dedicated access point so distant Nodes that can't see the home AP can still associate and relay their readings via the Gateway. Credentials are shown on the Gateway's own /setup page once you're on the LAN.
  • Live dashboard. Client roster, ingest status, queue depth, dropped counts, mesh TX/ACK counters — all visible at the gateway's IP.
  • Remote mesh commands. Send set-default-meter, clear-db, reboot, ping, query-status, set-sampling to any node by ID, over the mesh, without needing direct WiFi reach.
  • Daily "By Node" email. Each morning, sends a summary of each Node's default-meter reading to multiple recipients via SMTP. Supports add/remove recipients without rebuild.
  • Keepalive pings. Pings every known client every 60 seconds to keep CC1101 PLLs warm and surface dead nodes early.
  • Flow synthesis. Computes interval-average gallons-per-minute at the gateway from consecutive volume readings — handy when meters themselves don't transmit flow.

Specs

MCU ESP32 dual-core (Heltec CT62 footprint)
Mesh radio CC1101 @ 433.92 MHz, 2-FSK, multi-hop, ACKed
Uplink WiFi 802.11 b/g/n + optional W5500 Ethernet (compile flag)
Ingest targetHTTP POST to Windows / FastAPI service on LAN port 41290
Fallback AP Dedicated SSID for stranded nodes during commissioning; credentials shown on the Gateway's /setup page
Firmware 0.1.36 (observable at /api/gw-diag)
OTA POST /update with new .bin; HTTP-only (no PuTTY needed)

Web endpoints

All endpoints are HTTP on port 80 of the Gateway's WiFi (or Ethernet) IP.

GET / Dashboard — client roster, ingest status, queue, mesh stats.
GET /setup Configuration page: WiFi credentials, ingest target, email settings, command cards.
POST /update Firmware upload (multipart).
GET /api/gw-diag JSON: gateway firmware, Ethernet link, ingest health, queue depth, mesh counters.
GET /api/clients JSON: connected nodes — id, chip, fw, RSSI, LQI, packet count, last seen.
POST /api/cmd/<op> Remote mesh commands — reboot, clear-db, set-default-meter, ping, query-status, set-sampling. Optional {"node_id": N} in the body to target a single node.
GET /api/email JSON: schedule config; POST to update interval / send time.
POST /api/email/add_recip Add an email recipient.
POST /api/email/del_recip Remove an email recipient.
POST /api/email/send_now Trigger immediate "By Node" report.

Setup page

The /setup endpoint is the Gateway's management console. From a single page you point it at a PC ingest service, set the timezone, change the protocol on any remote node over the mesh, set the default meter, clear a node's database, ping or reboot a wedged node, run per-field queries to recover edge-of-range nodes, and schedule the daily "By Node" email — without leaving the gateway's web UI.

Gateway /setup configuration page: Database Host (ingest service target), Time Zone, Set Default Meter, Set Protocol, Clear DB / Ping / Reboot, Query Node Status, Per-field Queries, and Email Reports cards.
live capture of http://<gateway-ip>/setup · sensitive values masked

For agents

A structured spec of this device is available at /api/gateway.json. The page above is also annotated with schema.org/Product JSON-LD in <head>.