I already have a plan for getting the power consumption down, at the moment the 10w idle consumption is caused by using mobile phones for internet connectivity. they are great for short-duration use like in my urban rovers but due to Android security there are restrictions like you have to have the screen on if your using the camera, and I can’t just turn them off and on remotely. to get around that im moving to a rasperry pi zero2 that is much easier to manage since I can just switch it off and on but because it doesn’t have a modem I will have to add a 4g wifi hotspot. if I want to drop the last 3w, then I could put the esp32 to sleep along with the 4g modem for a timeout or until something like a radar or vibration sensor is interrupted. in that mode, it would run for weeks just from the backup battery alone. it could still do some basic tasks using its ultra low power core without waking it up but its complicated to get set up.
domoticz automation system is what is monitoring my rover, im using it to log sensor information as its much better for using over months compared to something like mission planner. it also lets me set up basic tasks using blockly rather than having to code every little action. its designed for home automation so some of the terminology is a little off like you have to use thermostat set points for all your set points and switch positions are set as % but it works.
