Author Topic: How is the group doing with finishing assembly of RED kits that aren't on line?  (Read 5917 times)

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Offline DaleReid

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I was just mulling over this last season, and as the chance for any significant local storms dwindling as the temps head towards freezing here in Wisconsin, began to think of the folks I've seen ask some questions about assembly, antennas, etc. and wonder how we're doing here in Region 3 (North and South America) having kits that are close to being complete, vs. those who have them sitting in a little box just waiting?

While the excitement of really hot storms ripping across the continent and the dancing lines on the display map now as rare as a hummingbird, I would like to know if there are folks out there who are stuck at a certain point, or are really close to coming on line, or have lost interest and want to pass their unassembled or partially assembled kits on to someone who is really has time and talent to bring more stations on line?

Anyone care to chime in about their possession of a kit but not on line as of yet?

It would be interesting to know, from Egon or whomever, how many kits were shipped over here during the last big push they had after the summer's break.  I wonder if it was five, ten, a hundred?  Just curious.  Mike, if you've ever been told that, and it isn't confidential, it might be of interest to know how many more stations might come up over the winter and be ready for next year.

Dale
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Offline Cutty Sark Sailor

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I know of at least 2 that have been delayed, for reasons out of their control... there may be others.  Gee, I remember when less than a handful of us "Reds" joined the 20 or so original "Greens" last year,... that was a real fun time... you "newbies" missed a lot of fun...  We've also got a few stations whose 'environments' have changed, and are not functioning to their known capability...  one of 'em is my H field... and we're sorta taking our time over the winter to see if we can mediate some 'new' noise and signal sources...
We've also got a handful of operators who for one reason or another, have not been able to optimize their systems, but knowing them, that won't last beyond a couple of weeks next spring... 
Bring it ON 2015!  Region 3 has you covered!
 


Offline Dr Obbins

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Looking at it, there are 23 stations "offline" and 12 of them have station numbers over the 1,000 mark. Also counted 13 stations with some sort of construction comment like "testing" etc... I think 3 stations came on line recently in Tennessee just south of me. Should really help the coverage in this area. (1166, 1181, & 1184)
« Last Edit: October 03, 2014, 10:39:11 PM by Dr Obbins »

Offline corwyyn

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Well mine is one of the 12 '1000' number stations offline.  Took it off a week back to get the e- field preamp installed on the mast of my weather station and wound up taking a spill off the step ladder when a leg sank into the ground. Nothing hurt but my pride but I need to get a better ladder before I finish things up.
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Offline W3DRM

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It is my understanding that due to some very restrictive personal privacy laws in Europe and elsewhere, the release of information about persons who have purchased a BO kit cannot be revealed. So, for the most part, we have to wait until we see a new site pop-up in the charts or the individual finds one of the BO related forums and makes a post announcing themselves to the BO world.
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Offline DaleReid

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I wasn't asking that they release a list of names, but it would be interesting to know that for instance fifty kits were shipped to north america after the summer break and before they ran out of stuff to populate the kits with. Sort of vague, you know.

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Offline weatherc

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It is my understanding that due to some very restrictive personal privacy laws in Europe and elsewhere, the release of information about persons who have purchased a BO kit cannot be revealed.

You need also to understand that not all want that their names are freely available about "now has this person bought a BO-kit". Any names about who have bought kits should never ever been released by the devs. If they do that do they a really big mistake, also legally.

It should allways be the operator responsibility if he/she want others to know about the BO-kit or not.

RE the kits. As in any network, one will never see that all joined will be online. That will just not happen. If i take European Weathernetwork as example there are all the time at least 10-20% of the stations offline for whatever reason.
« Last Edit: October 04, 2014, 01:47:32 PM by weatherc »

Offline Cutty Sark Sailor

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You wanta really know how import privacy is to the developers?
1. They won't even tell moderators or other developers "who's who".
2. They obscure your location info for any public pages... your station location is often off by kilometers...
3. Your lat and long is ONLY available to other active operators who are logged in, and that's ALL they get.
4. It was with great reluctance they enabled Personal Messaging on the BO forum, and for participants only.
5. They will not even share an email address with those of us interested in helping a station with possible issues, or to offer help.
etc... etc...
So a list of prospective station operators is totally out of the question.  That is not going to happen, based on my information. Period.

Mike
 


Offline weatherc

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I know. And hopefully it stays so also in the future too.
Privacy should be taken seriously and userdata should not ne shared in any way ever if not the user in question specifically allows it.

Offline SLOweather

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Anyone care to chime in about their possession of a kit but not on line as of yet?

I have had my kit for a couple of weeks. Still finding time to work on it.

Offline DaleReid

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Good to know there will be more kits assembled over the winter and brought on line.

Guys, I FULLY agree with voluntary reporting of possession of a kit, and would also be peeved if someone had published my name and address.

I must not type well enough, because I think in message #5 I was asking only for an idea of HOW MANY kits may have been sent to region 3, not a bit about who got them, what states and so on.

I was just curious if we'd see a nice bunch for spectacular coverage springing up in the spring.  Even if they were shipped to a state, and that might be interesting to know, that doesn't mean that the station would go on line there, so that isn't the world's most important stuff to be aware of.

I also remember a series of notes earlier from generous members saying they would assist other builders if they got stuck, within the limits of not having test equipment and so on.  I've not heard of a request for help lately so maybe IF there are builders that need some reassurance or advice, then use this thread to ask some of the members if they'd have any time or inclination to assist.

Sorry about stirring the pot on asking for info that I really didn't intend to, guys!

Dale
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Offline DaleReid

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Old man, old mind....

I was also going to ask if anyone had the presence of mind to take snapshots of the little map of the USA on lightningmaps.org with statistics/network with the green dots showing active stations, over time.

It would be neat, well I think so, to have a .gif image made of that map, with a frame per month, or every two weeks, to show the growth from about 30 some when I began to watch to the 70 or so that are listed now.  Sort of like popcorn storms popping up on the radar as the time lapse rolled by.

No, I'm not that bored, but just thought it might be cool.  I, of course, didn't think about doing that over the spring summer and fall.

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Offline miraculon

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Old man, old mind....

I was also going to ask if anyone had the presence of mind to take snapshots of the little map of the USA on lightningmaps.org with statistics/network with the green dots showing active stations, over time.

It would be neat, well I think so, to have a .gif image made of that map, with a frame per month, or every two weeks, to show the growth from about 30 some when I began to watch to the 70 or so that are listed now.  Sort of like popcorn storms popping up on the radar as the time lapse rolled by.

No, I'm not that bored, but just thought it might be cool.  I, of course, didn't think about doing that over the spring summer and fall.

I looked through my "Pictures" directory and found only one that looked interesting. This was from May 9th of 2013. The red dots are the stations at that time. Yes, there were that few!

Mine was the one in SE Lower Michigan, since moved "Up North"...

Greg H.


« Last Edit: October 04, 2014, 07:54:47 PM by miraculon »


Blitzortung Stations #706 and #1682
CoCoRaHS: MI-PI-1
CWOP: CW4114 and KE8DAF-13
WU: KMIROGER7
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Offline DaleReid

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And the plots at that time had arcs of resolution plotted too as an option.  That would be cool, too.

But alas, the servers are working their tails off with all the strikes, noises and proliferation of stations.

You were a pioneer.  Glad you were able to keep the system up and running, and entice others to join you.

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Offline Dr Obbins

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Not to call anyone out or anything, but this slow lightning season might be a good time to tune our stations to get rid of unwanted signals. For example sending over 75,000 signals in the past hour and only 10 of them are recorded as strikes?

Offline W3DRM

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Old man, old mind....

I was also going to ask if anyone had the presence of mind to take snapshots of the little map of the USA on lightningmaps.org with statistics/network with the green dots showing active stations, over time.

It would be neat, well I think so, to have a .gif image made of that map, with a frame per month, or every two weeks, to show the growth from about 30 some when I began to watch to the 70 or so that are listed now.  Sort of like popcorn storms popping up on the radar as the time lapse rolled by.

No, I'm not that bored, but just thought it might be cool.  I, of course, didn't think about doing that over the spring summer and fall.

Dale,

Assuming all of the lightning data for Region 3, since the beginning, is still available, I would think that someone (a participant, of course) would be able to search through the strike data archives looking for the first occurrence of a strike from each station. It would be like reverse engineering by finding all of the known station id's and then looking for the earliest date/time stamp coming from a specific station. Once you had the first strike info from each station, it would be simple to build a chart or image showing the progression of sites coming on-line. You could even animate it with whatever time-lapse you wanted to show. That is beyond my skills but I am sure there are one or more BO participants on this forum who have those skills. I used to have a software package that did that very thing with earthquakes. It went back through the USGS earthquake database and built an animated map showing quakes around the world. Like lightning strikes, it was quite mesmerizing to watch the quakes as they occurred over time.
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Offline DaleReid

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Thanks for the suggestion, I never thought of that route!

Right now it is cold enough the *)((&(% mosquitoes and gnats aren't eating me and the outdoors work is in a race to get done before I run out of fall, but when the winter winds howl and I'm sitting by the fire wondering what to do, I will look to see how easy it is to find those data points. 

All in the interest of mixing art and science.

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Offline n1dq

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As one of those people who got the kit recently, I've been struggling to make it work (and understand what I'm supposed to be doing!).

It seems that I made a mistake and just order an E-Field kit rather than H-field (or both). C'est la vie.

I succeeded in building it, and it sort of works. However, none of my signals look anything like the nice charts that other E Field users report. I'm station 1182 (Massachusetts: Carlisle)

The controller board appears to work -- if I jumper the channels on the amplifier board together, then the controller reads all three channels as having the same value.

I do get detections -- they look like:



I'm really looking for pointers as to how to debug this. I've stared at the boards, and all the joints look good. My gut is telling me that I'm reporting stuff at random and sometimes it happens to line up with a stroke.....

Any pointers?

Offline W3DRM

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Can you supply some high resolution photos of both sides of your boards? We may then be able to see something you missed. Just looking at your signals, doesn't give us enough info to go on. I am assuming you have gone through the initial start-up tests. We can see signals so at least the basics seem to working. I don't like the look of the waveforms though so perhaps you might have a misplaced component or two. Double check the resistors as they are really difficult to see due to their small size. Just stabbing in the dark here until we can see some photos of the pre-amp, amp and controller PCB's.

Some other questions:
  • How long is your E-field antenna
  • Is it vertical?
  • How high is it? - it needs to be at least 10 to 12 feet off the ground
  • Are you using shielded Cat-5/5e/6 cable? - How long is it?
  • Are you using RG-6 (72-ohm) cable between the pre-amp and the E-field Amplifier PCB? - How long is it?
  • Is your Controller (and ONLY your controller) board grounded? - Multiple ground are not allowed
  • Does the LED on the pre-amp PCB glow dimly with power applied?
As far as only having the E-field installed, that should not reduce your ability of detecting lightning with your system.

73's - Don - W3DRM
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Offline DaleReid

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Don,
Excellent summary and I'll give the builder the reassurance that for the last couple months my station is ONLY running an E-field.
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Offline Cutty Sark Sailor

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Missing lower half of signal. Scope would be real handy to determine stage where signal clamped... most likely early stages, since common to all three channels... Preamp, - or IC 1, IC2a or 2b on amplifier...  check preamp protect diodes D1 and D2 for proper polarity, and preamp IC1 resistors for proper positional value. e.g. R2 and R4 not reversed, or  R2 and R3 not reversed in amp IC1, etc...   Most likely bad solder connection, since most issues usually resolve to that.
 


Offline miraculon

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As one of those people who got the kit recently, I've been struggling to make it work (and understand what I'm supposed to be doing!).

It seems that I made a mistake and just order an E-Field kit rather than H-field (or both). C'est la vie.

I succeeded in building it, and it sort of works. However, none of my signals look anything like the nice charts that other E Field users report. I'm station 1182 (Massachusetts: Carlisle)

The controller board appears to work -- if I jumper the channels on the amplifier board together, then the controller reads all three channels as having the same value.

I do get detections -- they look like:



I'm really looking for pointers as to how to debug this. I've stared at the boards, and all the joints look good. My gut is telling me that I'm reporting stuff at random and sometimes it happens to line up with a stroke.....

Any pointers?

In addition to Cutty's suggestions, please check the voltage at C55 (+ side) GND on the controller board. This is the connection between R62,R63,C55,C56 and RN-42-1.

It should be 1.5V. I suspect that the half-rail reference point might be shorted to ground. If this is not ~1.5V, check the diodes at the inputs, R63/R62 for presence and correct values (1K). Also, check C55/C56 for correct polarity.

Greg H.


Blitzortung Stations #706 and #1682
CoCoRaHS: MI-PI-1
CWOP: CW4114 and KE8DAF-13
WU: KMIROGER7
Amateur Radio Callsign: KE8DAF

Offline n1dq

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How long is your E-field antenna
Is it vertical?
How high is it? - it needs to be at least 10 to 12 feet off the ground
Are you using shielded Cat-5/5e/6 cable? - How long is it?
Are you using RG-6 (72-ohm) cable between the pre-amp and the E-field Amplifier PCB? - How long is it?
Is your Controller (and ONLY your controller) board grounded? - Multiple ground are not allowed
Does the LED on the pre-amp PCB glow dimly with power applied?

The antenna is about 25 cm long. It is vertical and is (until I took it down to photograph the pre-amp) in my attic which is 30 feet above the ground. My workbench is also in the attic, so all of the parts of the system are up there as well.

The Cat-6 STP is 25ft (but coiled up on my bench).
The RG6 is 50ft and pretty much stretched out to get the antenna away from my workbench.
** The controller is not grounded -- I did try grounding it and it didn't seem to make much difference. I'll try again tonight. However, my ground wire is 30ft long to get to ground.
The LED on the preamp does glow nicely.

I am red/green colour blind, so resistor color codes are a nightmare. I actually check all resistor values with a meter before using them.

Here are the photos of the three boards:

Amplifier



Preamp



Controller



Looking at the controller board with a loupe, I think that there are a couple of joints that I want to touch up. I'll do that tonight along with the other checks that people have suggested.

Thanks

Philip

p.s. I didn't get to this last night -- it was back-to-school parent night at the high school where the kids attend. 2+ hours of teachers talking enthusiastically about their subjects!


Offline miraculon

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There are a couple of solder joints on P2 (the long header row that connects to the STM board) that look questionable in the photo. (near either end of the header)

Greg H.



Blitzortung Stations #706 and #1682
CoCoRaHS: MI-PI-1
CWOP: CW4114 and KE8DAF-13
WU: KMIROGER7
Amateur Radio Callsign: KE8DAF

Offline Cutty Sark Sailor

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Spent a few minutes looking at your pictures... explored a few a bit further...
It's especially difficult to tell from images what solder connections are good and what aren't... so the link may
be totally meaningless in most cases,... but I'd sure check the marked areas... especially those which did
not wick up to the board top to secure the components on top paths....
http://frankfortweather.us/misc/potential%20issues%20.pdf

Mike