Topic: Station Manufacturers Going Under?

[Stormtracker]

I am hearing rumors of some prime weather station manufacturers going out of business.  Specifically, TWI, Cape Cod, among others.   Any truth to these rumors?

[Lighty269]

Don't know about Acurite, but after recent issues and people like myself, leaving for other products. They should be on the list.

[nincehelser]

Don't know about Acurite, but after recent issues and people like myself, leaving for other products. They should be on the list.

BS.  I think you'll find far fewer than you expect "leaving".

[DaleReid]

I can't say they went under since there was no official notification, but their web site has in big red letters that they are no longer manufacturing weather stations. There is a list of some replacement parts available.

Sad, since they had super built stations that just kept on working.  Maybe that (along with lack of wireless mode for old stations) was the problem.  They had newer versions that were wireless, but a whole different look.

[Bushman]

When you can get a "weather station" mfg. in China for  about 50 bucks, it is pretty hard for US made products to compete, regardless of quality.  And at the higher end, you have Davis etc.  And don't forget Kickstarter pumping out crowd-funded wx stations.

[blizzardof78]

When you can get a "weather station" mfg. in China for  about 50 bucks, it is pretty hard for US made products to compete, regardless of quality.  And at the higher end, you have Davis etc.  And don't forget Kickstarter pumping out crowd-funded wx stations.

And spend that $50 once or twice a year to have a WX Station. I now call Accu-Rite "In-Accu-Rite" as I had serious issues with them many years ago. Spend the $300 for a Davis Vantage Vue which should last you several years instead of 1. Their ISS batteries evden last at least 5 years at a time.

[DaleReid]

There is a reason that RM Young, Campbell Scientific and Met One stuff costs so much.  If you were to buy it new it wouldn't be accessible to many except the very well to do hobbyist.  Things fit.  Things are drilled on a jig or computer driven mill, and plastic is form injection molded. 

I am amazed at the slight cost of some of the arduino and RaspPi sensor boards with quite good sensitivity, but that is at the risk of them being designed with a different philosophy, and then assembly where labor is a very small part of the whole picture.

There is something about the feel of a solid piece of equipment and the technology to have tested it to 'almost' NASA limits.  Problem is that drives up the cost to a point that only the government and the research labs at Universities can afford the stuff.  The balance point I guess.

[miraculon]

I see that notice on Texas Weather Instruments.

Too bad, the WRL sensor set mechanicals were used in my Dallas Semiconductor weather station, which I had from 1998-2011. The anemometer/vane were the same parts as was the rain gauge. The electronics were DalSemi. They used the weather station to showcase their One-Wire parts.

I bought the Davis in 2011.



Greg H.

[DaleReid]

Greg,
That is VERY interesting that folks used those parts for other projects.

Since the one-wire thing was more of a build your own, there didn't happen to be a schematic or how to wire and read the anemometer head so one might have insight as how to fix one if it is flaky?

Any other info on the use of that head?
Really interested.  Dale

[miraculon]

Dallas Semiconductor, which was absorbed by Maxim stopped selling them quite a long time ago.

There was a Mexican outfit called AAG that made a clone of the DalSemi station. Their link seems to be dead, so I don't know if they folded up too. According to the "wayback machine", the last time the site was up was in 2013. It did archive something from June 2013.

I did find this PDF on an Australian site: https://www.energymatters.com.au/images/aag/Assembly%20Instructions.pdf

I used a program that ran on my Linux box called "One Wire Weather" (OWW) by Simon Melhuish in the UK.

See http://melhuish.info/simon/projects/index.html



Greg H.

[Bushman]

AAG Electronica's wx business is long gone.  They, in fact, were the mfg. for the stations that Dallas sold!  I had one for years; sold it and then it lasted with the new owner's marina until a 12 ga blast took it out.  Rock solid stuff.   There is lots of info on it around the Interwebs.  Same for add-on 1-Wire stuff (of which I have a bunch that I am trying to sell - shameless self-promotion here).