Snow is best measured using a ruler, since it has no appreciable acoustic signature and the Sky has no provisions for measuring water equivalent as it melts…
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We got rain yesterday – Yeah! It’s the first rain in like 6 months and the first time my Sky got wet. After seeing all the various reports of under reporting and over reporting I was pleasantly surprised that mine was very close to what my old Acurite was reporting.
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Yes, the reason is that right now every SKY device (except a small number in the test group) has the same calibration settings - which was an average that came out of 100’s or rain events reported by the test group devices. The differences in both directions are strong because individual SKY installations can have quite different sensor response to the same rainfall. This is one key part of the challenge.
We will be rolling out updates to the CL process in stages and the calibrations on individual units will be adjusted to provide more accurate rain totals.
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Hi in the last 24hr 0900 Oct 4 to 0900 Oct5
WF recorded 19.9mm
Rain gauge 20.5mm
we had very light to sometimes heavy rain and thats the best one days rain we,ve had since Feb total rain this year 212.2mm about 1/4 of our average annual. Hope we get a lot more soon
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What I read here beteeen the lines : the components and the manufacture have a wild, unexpected variation?
And both can have an effect wich is gaining the deviation or lowering like constructive or destructive interference, correct ?
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Think about how much of a force a small drop of rain exerts when hitting the SKY. Very small. This means that for devices in the price category for the WF systems it is cost prohibitive to have each one calibrated perfectly after installation. Add in the fact that some force patterns have to be filtered out and it isn’t hard to see why measurements are all over the place. The machine learning being developed is a brilliant solution to keeping the price down and also giving us a continuously improving station.
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Not quite. The components and manufacture have a small variation, and we try to account for this with a factory calibration process. That was expected from the start. What was unexpected was the variation in the sensor signal due to your specific installation (pole material, pole length, things attached to pole, structure to which pole is mounted, etc).
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That is what happens when you do something that has never been done before.
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I had a little light rain today and got these results.
WF .17 inch
Davis Vantage Pro .16 inch
Measured cocorahs .16 inch
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So far today - VP2 which matches a CoCoRAHs gauge 0.51" - WF 0.80"
I can only point to the cartoons in this tweet that I ran across today https://twitter.com/reacharavindh/status/1048177134341173248/photo/1
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Thought I’d chime in. Stronger rainfall here on Thur and Fri and Sky seemed to record things well. Yesterday and today lighter but consistent rain and almost no rainfall recorded.
I’ve had rain of various intensities and amounts in the last 3 days and the measurements are now matching my other gage instead of reporting 4X the actual rainfall as in the past. 1.13" Friday, 0.47" yesterday, and 0.71" so far today.
v94 on the station, v43 on the Sky.
Seattle mist here. VP2 and CoCORaHS gauges match at 0.07 inches so far today. WF at 0.0049 inches.
Have had light rain here for the last several days with no accumulation reported. Heavy rain seems to register but as I don’t currently have an old school rain gauge I can’t speak for the accuracy.
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My sky measures after the update to v94 much better than before, but still a little bit much with moderate rain
…and it also registers very light rain
It has been showering steadily for the last several hours. My weather flow reports nothing. Contrast that with a few weeks ago when during a period of several heavy rain storms the weather flow consistently under (EDIT - This should say OVER-reported) reported compared to my tipping buckets and Cocorahs gauge.
I have seen phantom wind reports on a relatively calm day higher than any gust I had ever recorded at my home.
The Air is working well once I told it it was 80’ lower than it actually is. The temp and barometric readings are right in line with my other stations and I like the lightning strike count. However, the wind and precipitation data is all over the place. Do you think this can be fixed with a few software updates? Color me skeptical.
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Well I have 250 hard earned bucks hoping they come through, FWIW, as do 3000 or so other folks with gear…but it us certainly understandable to be unsure if that’s going to happen in the near future or not.
The old school sensors for temp and humidity seem ok. I’m not believing any of the fancy stuff at all yet either. Fingers crossed.
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Just remember it is hard doing something for the first time. Being on the bleeding edge of technology isn’t for everyone. Some of us bought in because we believe in the vision and want to have a part in making it come to fruition. I’m sure if you didn’t want to wait on it that there is someone out there who would buy your WF station.
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Last twenty four hours precipitation:
Rainwise #1 - .16"
Rainwise #2 - .16"
Cocorahs - .17"
Weatherflow - .00"
I do hope they can fix this, and the tech seems “cool”, just no where near ready for prime time. I’m sure not going to climb up onto my roof to sell it to someone else.
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My unit has gone from over-producing rainfall to under producing rainfall, most likely since the v94 upgrade. Manual gauge .16 inches vs. .03 inches for Weatherflow.
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