I’ve seen a post from a few years back, stating that you can’t hook a WS-2310 to a computer when the console is plugged in. Apparently, this leads to erroneous readings do to a grounding problem. Has anyone ever come up with a remedy for the grounding problem? I’d prefer to run the station off of 110V, but my station crumps out when I plug it in and then connect to the computer. Secondly, I’d like leave my base station in the kitchen, about “10 feet” above the logging computer in the basement, is it possible to extend the ‘serial’ connection. My house is wire with Cat 5e, can I plug serial connection into a ‘LAN’ line and then connect the base station into the other end with a regular 4 wire phone cord? Or do I have to build some special cable to make the distance? If the latter, does anyone know the pin out needed on the line?
I don’t know the answer to your grounding question, but I think your Cat5 based serial connection should work fine assuming the Cat5 cabling is point-to-point and you’re not trying to connect via a hub/switch. You’ll just need to make up RJ45 to serial plug/socket cables…or remove the patch boxes and wire it directly. The RJ45 adapter solution would look much neater and might prove to be more relaible in the long run.
Chris, thanks for the input. My thought was to plug the ‘serial to RJ-11’ wire that came with the WS-2310 into a female RJ-45 in my patch panel in the basement. That plug is wired IAW T-568B standard to another female RJ-45 wall plug in the kitchen.
Someone a while back had recommended making a serial to RJ-45 connector, but never supplied a pin-out. Being that the RJ-11 to serial connector is sealed I can’t easily determine the pin-out using it. If I had that pin-out, I could just make a longer ‘serial to RJ-11’ cable, but I still think using the installed Cat 5e would look cleaner.
the solution is to replace all the wiring, like from the temp/hum sensor to the anenometer and the windspeed with twisted pair shielded wires, and also from the temp/hum sensor to the console
I forgot to mention that I'm not having problems with the sensor wires yet. I recall reading a post somewhere that you shouldn't have the erroneous readings if you don't have the base station wired to the sensors and if you secure the anemometer and rain gauge leads so that they don't move in the wind. This suggested to me that the cheap wires could generate static easily if they moved around alot. Is this not the case?
I only seem to have problems when the power supply is connected to the base station. I'm trying to resolve that problem before I go to wiring the sensors to the base station. But maybe I'll just have to run the sensor and base station on batteries and move on.