connects and disconnects 5 seconds later every time

I moved all your comments into this thread to keep things organized. It was making me dizzy

It connects and disconnects because the ESP32 RELAY firmware is a relay. It acts as a passthrough to the connected arduino. The ESP32 relay firmware on its own will not do anything with a connection from ARC. The relay will forward and receive all data from the wifi to the RX and TX ports of the ESP32

So you'll need the Arduino UNO firmware on the Arduino. Then connect the arduino's TX0 to the ESP32's RX0. And then connect the arduino's RX0 to the esp32's TX0

Once the ESP32 and Arduino are connected, you can use ARC to connect to the ESP32 relay.

I’m on a long drive and it’s the weekend so the office is closed for anyone else to respond. But I’ll draw a quick diagram tonight or tomrorow for you that might clear things up

Dj Sures, you're the man. I appreciate that. I do have the esp connected the way your describing I believe with the TX and rx pins as well as the 5v and ground pins. The first thing I did was compile and load the ezb firmware onto the uno.. then I hooked up esp32 and flashed the corresponding esp32 with arduino relay firmware. Before I flashed the esp32 firmware tho I was able to connect to the uno thru the com port. I'm missing something here..

I have again verified that with just the uno connected via serial cable ARC will connect via COM port as an ez-b. Once i connect the ESP32 and attempt connection via wifi it will not connect. Again, if i view the serial monitor in ide i can see the connecting and disconnecting from ez-b client but there is seemingly no acknowledgement of the ezb uno board.

In looking thru the EZ-B Uno firmware i see that the primary communication interface defined as : serial. Could this be causing an issue? Or not because it should effectively identify the communication thru those terminals AS serial?

Serial is the Serial0 which is the tx0 and rx0 ports - so that is correct. Do not change that

My internet isn't turned on yet so I have to use my phone. In your photo, it looks like the RX and TX lines are connected incorrectly. It looks as if you have TX0 of the Arduino connected to TX0 of the ESP32.

Connect the arduino's TX0 to the ESP32's RX0. And then connect the arduino's RX0 to the esp32's TX0

Also, check the esp32 firmware to make sure the baudrate matches the arduino, which is 57600. That’s something I’m unsure what value is set on the esp32

Again, ARC is notconnecting to anything. It is attempting to make a connection through the ESP32. The ESP32 is unable to relay data to the Arduino. Therefore, ARC disconnects because it does not receive any data. The ESP32 is not dropping the connection. ARC is dropping the connection because no data is coming through the ESP32 from the Arduino. I wrote more detail about this in a previous response you want to scroll up and reread. Lots to type on a phone screen haha

The pins on this particular esp32 are not marked with the same nomenclature but I did swap those connections in hopes that would solve it. It did not. I did change the line in the firmware that sets baud for communication to arduino from 115200 to 57600. This also did not connect. Seems all functions with the relay connection from ARC but there is absolutely no communication to the uno after that and so it disconnects as you've explained multiple times.