I recently purchased an XFOC+ Gram scale with an RS-232 connection, and I am having trouble connecting it to my PC. I have a cable that goes from RJ12 to USB, which seems to be suitable for the connection. However, when I attempt to connect the device to my PC, it appears that the scale is not sending any data.

My goal is to connect the scale using a Python code, but even though the code appears to be functioning correctly, I am not receiving any data from the scale. I have also attempted to connect using other software such as Putty or Hercules, and while the connection is established, no data is being transmitted.

Moreover, I have found that the manual lacks sufficient information. It suggests performing certain operations that the scale does not seem to support. I am in need of assistance to determine whether the scale is indeed sending data or not. Can you explain how I should set the scale for continuously sending data?
I would greatly appreciate any guidance and support in resolving this issue and understanding the functionality of the scale's data transmission.

 

Communication issues are almost always caused by one or more of the following: incorrect wiring, incorrect communication settings, or incorrect communication packets.

In order to help you, you need to provide more details.

1. What is the vendor and model of the USB to RJ12 adapter? Is it a USB to RS-232 adapter? Have you tried a different adapter, such as a standard USB to RS-232 adapter with a DB-9 connector?
2. How have you connected the USB to RJ12 adapter to the scale? Please detail all wiring connections made, any adapters, cables, etc. used.
3. What communication settings are you using in your Python code and/or terminal emulator? Note that the scale is fixed at 9600 baud, 8 data bits, no parity, 1 stop bit.
4. What are the exact bytes that you're sending in your request data packets? The scale uses what may be the most needlessly complicated communication protocol I've seen, in that it takes several requests/responses to perform a single action. Also, since the communication protocol is a binary protocol (i.e. hexadecimal bytes), I don't believe you can use a terminal emulator such as PuTTY, as these may only send ASCII characters.

The scale also seems to support different communication modes (refer to the Scale protocol transferring section in the manual), but since the manual is not very clear, I'm not able to decipher what changing those modes actually does.