garo-gnm1d-moxa

Overview

This repository contains code for extracting data from Garo 1-phase energy meter GNM1D-RS485.

The meter exposes meter readings via an RS-485 interface.
A Moxa 5630 serial-to-tcp converter is used to make the meter readings available via a TCP port. Once the energy data has been extracted it's stored in an InfluxDB time series database.

Logging is done to console and optionally also disk files.

Optional features:

• Info and failure notifications can be sent to a Slack channel.
• Heartbeat messages (in the form of http calls) can be sent to infrastructure monitoring tools.
• Uptime logging to console, log files and InfluxDB. Includes metrics on uptime and memory usage.

Technical details

Hardware

• Garo GNM1D-RS485
• Moxa 5630-16

Other serial-to-TCP Moxa devices might also work too - they have a pretty wide product range that in respects are very similar.

A sibling repository contains code for Garo 3-phase meter GNM3D-RS485.

Software

• The code is developed and tested against Node.js version 20.
• The service can be run as a native Node.js app, but Docker is by far the preferred option for running the service. Kubernetes also works well, but requries more infrastructure, setup etc.
• Docker images (mountaindude/garo-gnm1d-moxa) is available from Docker hub. It's automatically updated as new releases are done here on GitHub.
• An InfluxDB database is needed. InfluxDB runs very nicely as a Docker container (just make sure to store the actual data outside of the InfluxDB container, so it's not lost if the InfluxDB container is recreated). InfluxDB 1.8.x is expected. InfluxDB v2 support may be coming at some point.
• Optional: A Slack account to which notifications can be sent.

Reference docs

• Garo Modbus documentation
• Moxa 5630-16 data sheet

Configuration file

The file config/production_template.yaml can be used as a starting point when configuring the service. Many features (uptime monitoring, healthcheck pings etc) are optional and can be disabled if so desired - but keep the settings in the YAML config file anyway (errors are likely to happen otherwise).

EnergyMonitor:
  # Logging configuration
  logLevel: info     # Log level. Possible log levels are silly, debug, verbose, info, warn, error
  fileLogging: true   # true/false to enable/disable logging to disk file
  logDirectory: ../log  # Subdirectory where log files are stored

  energyMeter:
    name: 'server_rack'
    description: 'Energy data for servers'
    id: 1
    phaseCount: 1

  slack:
    webhookURL: <Slack webhook URL>
    channel: <channel name>

  # Heartbeats can be used to send "I'm alive" messages to any other tool, e.g. a infrastructure monitoring tool
  # The concept is simple: The remoteURL will be called at the specified frequency. The receiving tool will then know 
  # that the energy monitor is alive.
  heartbeat:
    enable: false
    remoteURL: <URL which should be called>
    frequency: 60000

  # Docker health checks are used when running the energy monitor as a Docker container. 
  # The Docker engine will call the container's health check REST endpoint with a set interval to determine
  # whether the container is alive/well or not.
  # If you are not using Docker you can safely disable this feature. 
  dockerHealthCheck:
    enable: false    # Control whether a REST endpoint will be set up to serve Docker health check messages
    port: 12398      # Port the Docker health check service runs on (if enabled)

  # Uptime monitor
  uptimeMonitor:
    enable: true                   # Should uptime messages be written to the console and log files?
    frequency: 60000               #
    logLevel: verbose              # Starting at what log level should uptime messages be shown?
    storeInInfluxdb: 
      enable: true
      instanceTag: server_rack     # Tag that can be used to differentiate data from multiple instances

  # Influx db config parameters
  influxdbConfig:
    enable: true
    hostIP: <IP or FQDN of InfluxDB server>
    hostPort: <InfluxDB port>
    auth:
      enable: false
      username: <InfluxDB username>
      password: <Pwd of user>
    dbName: <InfluxDB database name> 
    measurementName: energy_server_rack

    # Default retention policy that should be created in InfluxDB when the service creates a new database there. 
    # Any data older than retention policy threshold will be purged from InfluxDB.
    retentionPolicy:
      name: 10d
      duration: 10d

  moxa:
    queryInterval: 5000   # 5 sec
    # queryInterval: 30000   # 30 sec
    # queryInterval: 150000   # Every 2.5 min
    # queryInterval: 300000   # Every 5 min  
    host: <IP or Moxa serial to TCP converter>
    port: <Port on Moxa>
    deviceId: <RS485 device ID set in energy meter. 1 by default>