Author Topic: WS-2080 Rain gauge mod?  (Read 3483 times)

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Offline zerb616

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WS-2080 Rain gauge mod?
« on: August 02, 2012, 05:21:09 PM »
Just installed a Ambient WS-2080.  A few evenings ago we had a hard rain storm, for about an hour.  I measured 0.81"; while my neighbor, who has a Davis about 70' away, measured 1.21".  I also have just a plastic tube that indicated ~1.20".  Both my gauges are located within 10' of each other.  Looking at the Davis compared to my Ambient WS-2080; I can see the the Ambient rain gauge is smaller/shallower than than the Davis.  So, maybe in downpours the Ambient cannot keep up or the water bounces out.  Is there another rain gauge that will work with my system?  Ed, tech at Ambient, said that this is a known problem, but no upgrade available.  He mentioned that others have made mods, plastic sheets??

Anyone have a solution. Maybe I should have bought a the more expensive Davis Vue??

Offline DanS

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Re: WS-2080 Rain gauge mod?
« Reply #1 on: August 02, 2012, 08:56:48 PM »
The gauge(s) you compare with need to be right up next to each other to be able to make valid comparisons. Just 2 or 3 feet apart and your readings can vary a lot. Even close together you need several rain falls to make an assessment.
You could verify the ws2080 is reading correctly by measuring the upper most dimensions of the funnel to get the capture area and figure how much water is needed to read 1 inch of rainfall. example, 5.5" by 2.5" = 13.75" = 225.322ml for 1" rainfall. Pour 225ml very slowly into the gauge to make it tip every couple of seconds or slower. A gauge resolution of 0.01" per tip needs 100 tips to read an inch. (You could cut the water measurement in half (112.5ml in this example) to check for 50 tips). This would give you an idea if the rain gauge is reading correctly or not. note: Unplug the rain gauge from the rest of the station to avoid false readings being recorded when testing it.
« Last Edit: August 02, 2012, 10:42:06 PM by DanS »