Flyfunston

Did something change?
Gusts no longer show as individual blips, but are rendered as a line. (This has been going on for over a week)

Rainfall: is the sensor working?

The Wundermap will let you find nearby weather stations while this one is being repaired.

http://www.wunderground.com/wundermap/?lat=37.67078&lon=-122.36023&zoom=9&type=hyb&units=english&rad=1&rad.num=1&rad.spd=25&rad.opa=70&rad.stm=0&rad.type=N0R&rad.smo=1&rad.mrg=0&wxsn=1&wxsn.mode=tw&svr=0&cams=0&sat=0&riv=0&mm=0&hur=0&fire=0&tor=0&ndfd=0&pix=0

Dave K.

We seem to have a problem with the PC that runs the weather station. Our techs are working on it.

It appears that the humidity/temp sensor went out again. In the course of breaking it sent in some bad data to the console that's messed up some other things.

We're working on a few solutions and will probably end up buying a replacement temp/humidity sensor. It's one of the circuit boards in the black cylinder you see atop the clubhouse.

We will also upgrade or replace the software on Comet, the weather computer in the clubhouse.

For the record, this is something like the 4th or 5th Davis Vantage Pro2 sensor that's gone out. I'm really disappointed in Davis Instruments at this point. While they picked up the cost of the previous sensors, it's a real pain in the butt to deal with this every year. They say it's due to proximity to water, but Funston is pretty standard ocean breeze without extreme temperatures and the weather station really should be able to handle it.

I agree that this is unacceptable. (And I thought my La Crosse ws2308 was bad)

You might ask them whose equipment SF Bay Area government agencies use?

Have they seen a photo of the installation and its relative position to the cliff?

In my several conversations with them they've said that they've seen this problem with stations that are close to large bodies of both salt and fresh water. They thought they had a fix last year with the new revision of the board, but apparently not.

If you have other recommendations, please post them here. I'll ask around too.

I did ask the Davis tech about better gear and he said there is some but at a much higher cost, like thousands.

He told me that we should be able to protect the sensor circuit board by blocking off most of the air vents into the chamber so moist air can't get to it.

If this trick dosen't work then we really should think about some mill spec gear.

Do we really care about humidity? Loosely bag (sealed, but not snug) the sensor inside the Black housing. Pressure differences should still work. Temperature might lag slightly. The bag is easy to remove and it is a CHEAP test.

One workaround it to move the temp/hum sensor into the clubhouse for protection from the elements.
The alternatives of bagging or otherwise protecting the PC board is also being considered, thanks!