Hi, I’m going to set up a system that must include sensors typical to Davis Vantage Pro2 Plus (solar and UV included) and will be running at remote location but will all required supplies (power, network).
I need to store the data at minute intervals. It would probably have to be some kind of SQL type database in parallel to anything else (e.g. WD files). Solar data is the highest priority followed by temperature and other.
I will need to run the WXSIM that will use the data from this location.
Questions:
What weather station is recommended? I was thinking Davis.
Should I have a PC running at the station’s location or could I read minute data from somewhere else?
Do I understand correctly that WLL offers parallel access to various clients (WD, weeex) that are connected to same wifi network?
Can WXSIM run in some other physical location but use station’s data from the cloud?
What are redundancy options for the weather station (e.g. if one sensor suite fails I’d need to switch to the secondary one that is installed in same location)? Would I need to duplicate all hardware or could I use same console and WLL and just switch the receiving channels?
Thanks for your advise. I might have more questions when I progress with this in the next few months.
I can’t 100% answer all of your questions but here’s what I know/think…
Based on what I see on the forum Davis seem to be the most reliable of the normal ‘consumer’ stations. There may be other options, e.g. Vaisala, which are as good/better but there aren’t as many forum users using them so it’s difficult to say for sure.
It depends on whether the minute data you can get from ‘cloud’ sources has all the data you need. If you’re only wanting raw data then I suspect Davis will have the data you need. I wouldn’t run a PC. A Raspberry Pi (if you’re using WD) or a Pi/other Linux SBC would work for CumulusMX. Whatever you’re running you’ll need remote access to perform upgrades and a remotely controlled power switch to do a complete power cycle if needed (I’m assuming remote doesn’t mean a few minutes away by car).
I believe so. I’m pretty sure I had both consolewd and CumulisMX running in parallel gathering data from my WLL. I say pretty sure because that’s over 12 months ago and I’ve done a lot more since then!
Yes - but! I run WxSim in a virtual PC on a hardware server based in Finland. You need to sync the WD .inf files to the server on a regular basis and then point WxSim at the server based files.
Thanks, Chris!
Regarding 4): I guess consolewd is sufficient to generate files required by WXSIM? Does consolewd support solar data from Davis?
This is a very valuable information to me, thanks much.
Having run the Davis VP2 for years, I would say it sounds like the station that will meet your requirements.
Yes
Personally I have no experience of WLL and would use a mini PC at the remote site, running Windows 11 Pro, to run Weather Display or any other software you want too. This allows you to remote into the PC to access the data files or transmit them to other clients directly.
See 2 above.
Yes - WXSIM will run for any location from the downloaded data files. The restriction is if you want to include the actual weather data from your weather station. Then you need access to allow WXSIM to download these data files. Remote access is fine and WXSIM work fine using WD’s data files.
With the cost of Davis equipment, is it worth having a complete second station on site and running, just in case one of the sensors fail? Doing this doesn’t stop one of sensors on the backup station from failing as they will both have to be on site and running.
In my experience with the VP2, with common sensor to fail is the temp/hum sensor, followed by the anemometer (but they have now changed the design and these are more reliable.
If it were me, I would hold spares and replace as they fail, rather then waist money on a complete second unit which will be running but redundant for most of the time.
I agree with @Budgie about not having an entire redundant sensor suite but instead, if sensors needed to be replaced quickly, have a set on hand to replace - depending how “remote” the station is for you to access. I had a VP2 in Florida for 12 years and I had to replace the humidity sensor (therefore temperature and humidity sensor) about every three years, which I think was due to the humid, and relatively salty environment (I lived 7 miles from the Atlantic Ocean). Now I live in a more temperate climate in Virginia and I have not had to replace any sensor on my new VP2 in over five years.
After thinking it really makes sense to have replacement parts just ready but not in operation.
Are there solar sensors available (at reasonable cost) that measure the indirect (diffusive?) radiation?
Did anyone try to do “cloud recongition” yet? E.g. have a sky camera and identify cloud location and density?
This is going to be another part of this install.
I’ve never replaced a Solar or UV sensor on my VP2 and that’s in about 12 years. As long as you clean the diffuser once in a while then they just seem to work. Granted, they’re not the cheapest sensors around but you get what you pay for.
Do you meant manual or auto cloud recognition? I’ve got my SkyCam setup to produce timelapes videos but I don’t know of any AI software to recognise cloud location & density.
That’s something I’ve been thinking about for some time. I’m part way through building two RPi fisheye cameras with the intention of trying match clouds and estimating their height/distance but I don’t know if that’s possible with the kind of distance separation I can achieve in our garden (or my software skills).
I have an allsky camera (actually more of them ) myself and looks quite useful during the day (I use it for night sky primarily). My colleagues are skilled in object recongition part so this will be left to them. I’ll have to find out if a “cheap” RPiHQ is sufficient for the project or not.
Coming back to WXSIM: I understand it uses the .inf files and not the “62023lg.txt” ones?
In this case I’d need to copy/download these files to the PC where WXSIM will run.
Further question: could I create the .inf files myself (this question is separate from the original post)?
My original plan was a ‘full’ RPi in each camera but I have recently been wondering whether a Pi Zero might be just as good but only for image capture and then send the data indoors for processing on something bigger. I’ve not made any real progress for a while due to lack of Pi hardware.
I use rsync to keep the log files updated for WxSim. That way you only update the few hundred bytes that have changed since the last sync so it’s not a big job to keep them updated. I use rsync to update the clientraw files too so it’s not a big job to do the log files at the same time.
I guess you could create the log files yourself. WD creates them so other software could do it too. I’ve never tried it though.
According to the WXSIMATE Help Files, it uses the 72023lg.txt and 72023vantagelog.txt (for the solar sensors) files in the logfiles folder, for the local station data input, which is where I have my own WXSIMATE pointing.
hmm, regarding the log files: does WXSIM read the .inf files or the actual text log files (white space separated)?
EDIT: this was answered above
For one of my cameras I use a RPi zero W v1.3 with the new camera module (model 3 wide). The allsky software installation took 24 hours… it does work but not for the timelapses. It creates startrails though. I use another PC that grabs the images to create what I want from individual images.
Just a note about Davis weather stations … they are moving away from the older consoles to a Weatherlink console that uses WIFI to post to weatherlink.com.
There is no direct interface from the new console to an on-site PC. We have used Davis weather stations for years starting with serial, then IP then USB interfaces. With the new console we are having WD pick up the readings from weatherlink.com
Under the WeatherLink IP interface / Weatherlink live, the data can be posted to WLL and WD.
I do not know
I am aware of an Enviromonitor gateway from Davis that supports multiple stations. I suppose this would still have a potential single point of failure limitation.
Thanks to all for replies. I have further questions.
Do WD and consolewd support Vaisala WXT536 and pyranometer (connected to WXT)?
Does anyone here have experience with Vaisala and WD in general?
If WD supports Vaisala, where does it get the data from? Is it from the data management unit, or?
Thank you.
Hi @eongibier , I might need a Vaisala system which will include also a WXT536 (and pyranometer). All sensors are connected to a DMU (data management unit), provided by Vaisala. My question is if it is possible to access this data by Weather Display or other software (e.g., weewx, consolewd, or Python).
Does the data management unit connect to the Ethernet or does it need a serial connection?
Thank you!
Vous pouvez accéder à ces données par Weather Display, j’ai résolu quelques soucis de configuration au début avec l’aide Brian durant sa disponibilité sur ce forum.
J’ai toujours privilégié une connexion série pour cette station météorologique. Ne pas oublier de mettre cette Vaisala avec un fil relié à la terre.
) myself and looks quite useful during the day (I use it for night sky primarily). My colleagues are skilled in object recongition part so this will be left to them. I’ll have to find out if a “cheap” RPiHQ is sufficient for the project or not.