Topic: Repeated signal dropouts

[SnowHiker]

The only favourable thing I'd say about VP1 was that supercap faults were rare, probably because of the more mechanically robust component type used.

Maybe I should add, that from my experience with the VP1, you can expect five years or so for the lifespan of the supercap.  I just accept that as routine maintenance.  I don't know how it compares to the VP2.

Another favorable thing about the VP1 is that the temp does work at least down to -40 (the lowest I've recorded was -41.5, and it didn't appear to bottom out, despite the stated specs), the new temp sensors are guaranteed to stop working at -40.  Maybe a relatively minor thing, but when we get a record low I like to have some idea of what it is.  But maybe getting a little off topic. 

[ValentineWeather]

Here was my VP2 console plot this year at -27F. Signal looked good but same day toward sunset dropped out at -5F.  This is longer distance at 370' console to ISS. New surfire battery also.
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[Mattk]

Regard ISS reception I would say that nobody should ever be expecting 100%, 100% of the time and there will be spikes by the very nature of signal and hardware and there will be some spikes be hot, cold or indifferent

[openvista]

Agreed. 100% reception isn't the standard, as far as I'm concerned. In fact, I have no issue with keeping temperature and wind active on the console and in my weather software (as opposed to dashes or zeros) when diagnostics show 96-98% packet completion.

I think the issue here is resyncs -- where the console loses a connection and has to poll for minutes or hours to regain a connection -- should not correlate positively to weather that half the country gets every winter (and that's a conservative estimate assuming 10F is the line; not the 20F figure that zackdog's graphs seems to suggest).

[Old Tele man]

Sorry, people, but equipment designed to operate at 1,000 foot distance and -40ºF should be working at those conditions...or (per FCC regulations) it's fraudulent marketing.

That being said, experience tells me that WHILE it should work per the specs, one should LIKEWISE assume 'degradation' to increase as distance "approaches" those specs...thus, everything should be 100% reception up to about 50% range, then slowly go DOWN as the distance approaches the "spec" limit of 1,000-feet...or...the temperature falls DOWN toward -40ºF.

[Mattk]

The ISS % reception is also only based on the Wind Samples received against the Wind Samples expected for the relative Arc Interval. Is this then indicative of the overall reception issue?   

[openvista]

The ISS % reception is also only based on the Wind Samples received against the Wind Samples expected for the relative Arc Interval. Is this then indicative of the overall reception issue?

No, I doubt anyone is too overly concerned with percentage of completed packets as long as they can maintain a signal lock with the transmitter. A dropped packet here or there isn't going to matter.  When loss of signal lock (and subsequent resynchronization) coincides with temps below 10-20F, there's a BIG problem. Especially when you are 50ft away from a transmitter and it indicates nearly full strength otherwise.

[Mattk]

The ISS % reception is also only based on the Wind Samples received against the Wind Samples expected for the relative Arc Interval. Is this then indicative of the overall reception issue?

No, I doubt anyone is too overly concerned with percentage of completed packets as long as they can maintain a signal lock with the transmitter. A dropped packet here or there isn't going to matter.  When loss of signal lock (and subsequent resynchronization) coincides with temps below 10-20F, there's a BIG problem. Especially when you are 50ft away from a transmitter and it indicates nearly full strength otherwise.

But that is what I am saying in regard the above ISS reception examples or are you obtaining signal lock/reception figures from another source? if so then the above ISS reception graphs are irrelevant then?

[zackdog]

The ISS % reception is also only based on the Wind Samples received against the Wind Samples expected for the relative Arc Interval. Is this then indicative of the overall reception issue?

No, I doubt anyone is too overly concerned with percentage of completed packets as long as they can maintain a signal lock with the transmitter. A dropped packet here or there isn't going to matter.  When loss of signal lock (and subsequent resynchronization) coincides with temps below 10-20F, there's a BIG problem. Especially when you are 50ft away from a transmitter and it indicates nearly full strength otherwise.

But that is what I am saying in regard the above ISS reception examples or are you obtaining signal lock/reception figures from another source? if so then the above ISS reception graphs are irrelevant then?

All I know is that when the ISS signal based on wind packets expected, or whatever, is down to zero I get absolutely no data from the ISS.  I have basically lost connection.  Maybe these show better what we are talking about.

Mark

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[Mattk]

Yes I have seen instances like that as well and that is probably based on a single ISS but take the example where there is a Wind transmitter then the ISS % reception is based on the Wind transmitter and maybe not the main ISS?? 

[zackdog]

Yes I have seen instances like that as well and that is probably based on a single ISS but take the example where there is a Wind transmitter then the ISS % reception is based on the Wind transmitter and maybe not the main ISS??

You have seen this happen and you don't find it a little disturbing?

I can see that, but I do not have a separate wind transmitter.

Mark

[openvista]

Mattk, I think we're getting down in the weeds here. Earlier today I posted an example graph from WeatherCat (Mac weather software) showing what wind "dropouts" look like in real time -- how long they last, how often they occur, and in what temperatures they occur. Several others have posted graphs demonstrating complete loss of ISS reception at similar temperatures. We have all shown this doesn't happen in warmer temps. And Mark has shown that even when a signal is locked as temps begin to fall below 20, packet completion lessens. I think we have a pretty good picture of the problem at this point.

[Mattk]

Ok then so is the ISS % based on the Wind Samples representative and what do Wind Spike samples justify? Like I can show you reception spikes based on transmitters 6" apart but honestly can anybody say wind sample statistics are representative?

[openvista]

I had to disable uploads to WeatherLink long ago because it was causing my weather software, WeatherCat, to lock up. So I don't have the same screens to post as others.

In WeatherCat, when the ISS loses a signal lock, the temperature and humidity flat line until a connection is re-established. It can last for hours. I have made a screen capture of an example of that. In addition, I get 0's and NaN's sent to my website. If I look over at the console when this is occurring, I see dashes appear in the temperature and humidity fields.  I can then pop into diagnostic or statistical screens on the console and see the dropped packets accumulating and the resync count incremented.

It's essentially the same process as wind dropouts, but the way WeatherCat responds makes it is easier to see with wind (drops to zero) than temp/humidity (flat lines at last recorded value).

[openvista]

I forgot to add that in addition to the flatlining graphs, WeatherCat increments a "sensor error" count. That corresponds to each poll of the console in which it encounters a sensor error. This is useful to establish how long a given outage lasted.

[openvista]

Ok then so is the ISS % based on the Wind Samples representative and what do Wind Spike samples justify? Like I can show you reception spikes based on transmitters 6" apart but honestly can anybody say wind sample statistics are representative?

This dynamic is tiresome. Several people have already posted a variety of visual evidence demonstrating complete (as well as partial) signal loss correlating to <10F temperatures in both ISS and wind transmitters. That's the takeaway. Not individual packet completion rates, not whether someone was using a wind transmitter and an ISS, not whether a spike in a graph could mean something else under completely different conditions. There's ample first hand accounts in this thread to supplement the graphs and confirm the true extent of the problem.

If you're going to contribute, perhaps take the time to read and understand what's already been posted rather than spraying barely coherent, hypothetical questions at everyone as you drive by.

[Mattk]

It's just a question focusing on is the signal reception based on wind samples relevant or not? There just appears to be a guilty verdict regardless of the evidence relevence

[SnowHiker]

It's just a question focusing on is the signal reception based on wind samples relevant or not? There just appears to be a guilty verdict regardless of the evidence relevence

I guess your point is that ISS Reception according to the Weatherlink help file is

The ISS Reception rate shows the percentage of wind data packets that have been successfully received by the Vnatage Vue, Vantage Pro or Vantage Pro2 console.

[The "Vnatage Vue" is Davis' typo.]

Someone can correct me if wrong, but I think they specify wind packets because they are updated and transmitted the most, every 2.5 seconds.  As I understand, other variables aren't updated so often.  However, as far as I can see, and apparently everyone else here seems to see, if wind packets aren't received, then no other packets are received either, and if a packet is received it will contain wind.  In short; every data transmission contains a wind packet, and if a wind packet isn't received no other data is either.

If the question has to do with separate wind stations, I have no personal experience, but as far as I can tell the ISS reception in WL is based on the ISS and doesn't show for other stations, though on the console in diagnostic mode I can see the reception % for other stations by pressing the "Station" button.

If the question is about how extra stations can affect the ISS reception, it can lower it a bit.  On the post where I posted my graph (post #97), you can see a slight decrease in ISS reception around the evening of January 17th, it corresponds to when I powered up an extra temp station I use to monitor water pipes when we get cold spells.

[johnd]

Someone can correct me if wrong, but I think they specify wind packets because they are updated and transmitted the most, every 2.5 seconds.

AIUI, it's actually a bit simpler than that. The wireless packets have essentially an identical format to one another and ALL contain wind speed data but the content of the rest of the 8-byte payload varies according to the sensor data being transmitted. So monitoring wind speed packets is actually the same as monitoring the complete packet stream from a given transmitter. Details are in DeKay's famous wiki:

https://github.com/dekay/DavisRFM69/wiki

(And also, reading between the lines a little, supported by the information in the Meteostick documentation.)

[SnowHiker]

AIUI, it's actually a bit simpler than that. The wireless packets have essentially an identical format to one another and ALL contain wind speed data but the content of the rest of the 8-byte payload varies according to the sensor data being transmitted. So monitoring wind speed packets is actually the same as monitoring the complete packet stream from a given transmitter. Details are in DeKay's famous wiki:

Thanks.    That's pretty much what I had in mind when I said

In short; every data transmission contains a wind packet, and if a wind packet isn't received no other data is either.

but wasn't able to speak as clearly, thoroughly, and concisely.

[SCP374]

On numerous occasions during very cold and dry weather, I've had a similar issue where the wind direction suddenly switches around to the south or SE and reports 0mph or occasionally a 1 or 2mph speed (even though it's blowing out of a N, NW or W direction and the wind cups are spinning at a decent clip).  At the same time this happens, the humidity and dewpoint spike up quickly and the temperature drops.  Has anyone else experienced this issue?  It seems to happen when the temperature gets into the teens or lower during a dry arctic airmass (which we had up here in Massachusetts for the better part of a week).  It has happened to me in previous winters too, the VP2 is about 6 years old now.  Any thoughts?

[openvista]

New Vue console has arrived!

I'm already seeing improvement. The most consecutive good packets received on the VP2 console today: ~1000 and on the Vue ~5000. VP2 console started recording statistics at midnight and the Vue this afternoon. Not bad.

I have 5 days coming up starting Friday with highs around 10 and lows near 0. So I should know more then.

[openvista]

So far so good on the Vue console. It's been below 10F since approximately 5:30AM EST (over 8 hours now). No outages for either transmitter. Not even a re-synchronization. I'm at 99% packet completion for both since midnight (and it's been 15F or colder that whole time).

However, the VP2 console, which is right beside the Vue console, lost connection with the ISS at 10:08AM and has tried 15 times to resync and been unsuccessful. That's an almost 4 hour outage, folks! In all probability, if I put it in setup mode, it would connect successfully (as it has in the past). The point is, though, that if I were away during that time, my website and all the data providers I upload to would be fed garbage until I returned and discovered it (best case scenario).

The next 24 hours should be spent at or under 10F. By Sunday early AM, it should be near/below 0F. I will report back later this weekend.

[dalecoy]

However, the VP2 console, which is right beside the Vue console, lost connection with the ISS at 10:08AM and has tried 15 times to resync and been unsuccessful.

Perhaps it's somewhere in this thread - but what is the firmware version of your VP2 console?  And it's age?

[CW2274]

The point is, though, that if I were away during that time, my website and all the data providers I upload to would be fed garbage until I returned and discovered it (best case scenario).

Why aren't you using the Vue for online?