I just purchased a set of 10 nRF24l01+ modules with a breakout board that looks like this:
Note: This is the nRF24l01+ chip, not a clone Si24Ri. Also, I'm using an Arduino Mega.
I'm following the Sparkfun tutorial here:
https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/nrf24l01-transceiver-hookup-guide
The wires are hooked up like so:
- 3.3V → VCC
- GND → GND
- PWM 8 → IRQ
- PWM 9 → CE
- PWM 10 → CSN
- PWM 11 → MOSI
- PWM 12 → MISO
- PWM 13 → SCK
I've verified the two modules are hooked up as they should be. I'm using the GettingStarted example program for both units. Whenever I go into the serial monitor when connected to the transmitter, I get garbage values like <¯�SžRÖ
being output. Whenever I try to transmit a message by entering t
, nothing gets returned. The same problem is happening on the receiver end.
As for troubleshooting:
- I've wiggled all of the jumper cables to verify a stable connection.
- I've swapped out the modules I was using with others from the package (twice) so the modules probably aren't bad.
- After reading that a capacitor is sometimes needed to provide a smoother voltage to the module, I upped the voltage from the 3.3V the Arduino was providing to a stable 3.5V from an external variable power supply to account for any small voltage dips. I don't have any capacitors available to me at the moment, so I figured this would be the next best option.
Unfortunately, my RF modules are still not correctly transmitting any data, and I don't know where to go from here.