Topic: WS-80 Ultrasonic Wind sensor array

[mauro63]

This is a comparison of temperature of ws80 vs a wh31 in a Barani Meteo Shield standard and Davis vantage pro 2 in passive five plates
the last graph is the deviation against the barani standard

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Mauro

[Mandrake]

OK, interesting analysis.
On the whole though given the tolerance of the actual sensor involved the performance is not bad against the reference.
For out of the box I think that's pretty reasonable performance.

[mauro63]

OK, interesting analysis.
On the whole though given the tolerance of the actual sensor involved the performance is not bad against the reference.
For out of the box I think that's pretty reasonable performance.

Thanks Mandrake,
I can confirm, was a day with good solar radiation and sky clear, yesterday and today, with some clouds, the performance are very similar
Very good the wind performance, a lot better than vp2
Mauro

[Mapantz]

Wait and see what occurs during sideways rain.. that's where they fall down.

[mauro63]

Today, sky clear in the morning, in the afternoon overcast

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[weather34]

Wait and see what occurs during sideways rain.. that's where they fall down.

just tell em to get the hose pipe out or chuck a bucket of water over it making sure they are saturated like after a few hours of steady rainfall then they will see what happens when the transducers get wet. notice in the direction graphs posted a few posts back same erratic directions i often seen here with ultrasonic even under calm or relative low winds. these are the tell tell signs .the ultrasonic sensors at this price point reveal some annoying things and the erratic behaviour drive you nuts.too much emphasis on low sensitivity you would need to see what happens at the other end under somewhat adverse wet conditions then we will see if it is living up to the hype we are seeing.  but who knows it may be a winner or another low cost entry into the technology that has some annoying flaws..lets hope its a winner

i prefer a stable direction pattern be it calm or storm strength..

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[Mapantz]

Wait and see what occurs during sideways rain.. that's where they fall down.

just tell em to get the hose pipe out or chuck a bucket of water over it making sure they are saturated like after a few hours of steady rainfall then they will see what happens when the transducers get wet. notice in the direction graphs posted a few posts back same erratic directions i often seen here with ultrasonic even under calm or relative low winds. these are the tell tell signs .the ultrasonic sensors at this price point reveal some annoying things and the erratic behaviour drive you nuts.too much emphasis on low sensitivity you would need to see what happens at the other end under somewhat adverse wet conditions then we will see if it is living up to the hype we are seeing.  but who knows it may be a winner or another low cost entry into the technology that has some annoying flaws..lets hope its a winner

i prefer a stable direction pattern be it calm or storm strength..

I do hope they don't suffer the same fate, but having had 3 different ones myself, they all succumbed to rainfall in the end.

A few years back, during a storm in the UK, there was an exceptionally high gust reading on a very expensive ultrasonic anemometer placed in Devon or Cornwall (can't quite remember) I decided to do some detective work on official stations as well as PWS ones that were close by. I couldn't find any evidence to back up the recorded gust, it was some 30mph higher than any official station had recorded in the whole of the South of England. I put that down to the dreaded wobbly rain drops.

Ultrasonic anemometers have been around for many years now and they still haven't replaced traditional cup anemometers, and for good reason. Ultrasonic ones may not have moving parts, but they are far less durable than the trusty cups!

[weather34]

the other bit i cant get my head around having just gone through the specs of this is the inclusion of the temperature perhaps there is a marketing purpose behind to bundle on . but it is what it is and seems like this reasonable entry to mid level product range is evolving quite rapidly but history of fine offset durability deters me ..once bitten twice shy..

[Mandrake]

I have read all your comments with interest and promise to keep the community advised of what I see having the benefit of both bits of kit especially with rain in mind.
I am sure Mauro in Italy will also as he has the benefit of a VP2 to compare with as well.

The transducers seem to be well recessed (see previous photo) and on the top of the sensor housing so I hope this might help on the rain droplet issue.

As for build quality, I don't disagree that there is a risk for anything mass produced at a cost point that you will get build issues, but in general I think the fine offset kit has come on leaps and bounds over the last 5 years in terms of technical design and quality of product. They also seem to be genuinely interested in what the community say about their products and keen to improve them when something is observed. Not many companies seem that invested these days and I know that they are developing all sorts of nice technology for the PWS market.

[mauro63]

I have read all your comments with interest and promise to keep the community advised of what I see having the benefit of both bits of kit especially with rain in mind.
I am sure Mauro in Italy will also as he has the benefit of a VP2 to compare with as well.

The transducers seem to be well recessed (see previous photo) and on the top of the sensor housing so I hope this might help on the rain droplet issue.

As for build quality, I don't disagree that there is a risk for anything mass produced at a cost point that you will get build issues, but in general I think the fine offset kit has come on leaps and bounds over the last 5 years in terms of technical design and quality of product. They also seem to be genuinely interested in what the community say about their products and keen to improve them when something is observed. Not many companies seem that invested these days and I know that they are developing all sorts of nice technology for the PWS market.

I agree, and you can be sure, I will post every positive or negative impression without filters
from yesterday I've turned the ws80 sensor to North, same exposition of vp2 and same height of vp2 anemometer
Ecowitt staff has my tests to learn what is good and what is wrong, and I think nobody low end company can have same attention, this is a very great value in my opinion
I cannot ask them to test the ws80 on water triple point, this is not a professional sensor factory

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Mauro

[Mapantz]

I thought i'd just post my weatherflow images to show you what to look out for.

Here's a graph of what used to happen.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1bDTAtIr398LRQMVMSnXSLsyhoJf6UuUz

The wind that day was coming from SSE to SE all day. You can see from before 4:30pm until 5pm that the arrows show this correctly. Just after 5pm was when the rain started. As you can see, the wind arrows changed to every direction from NW to NE. However, the wind direction hadn't actually changed. Also, the wind had started gusting higher at 5pm. It started off OK until the rain arrived. Look at all those troughs dropping down, they were completely wrong recordings to what was actually going on outside.

This was the culprit:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1S4guPuqqxRCtjOP6OhX-zTfO31nZPJ2O

[Mandrake]

Thanks Mapantz, the weatherflow looks to be a similar design!
I guess all we can do is wait for a windy rainy day, which as we head for Autumn is only a matter of time here in the UK!

[ukwoody]

Mauro,
I just love your garden. It looks lovely. I am so envious, lol
Woody

[ukwoody]

the other bit i cant get my head around having just gone through the specs of this is the inclusion of the temperature perhaps there is a marketing purpose behind to bundle on . but it is what it is and seems like this reasonable entry to mid level product range is evolving quite rapidly but history of fine offset durability deters me ..once bitten twice shy..

No. this is covered in another post.  As I understand it, sound travels at different speed dependent on temperature (+/- 7% AFAIK)  so the temp readings are used to "correct" the wind speed.  One of our kind friends on here did post as full explanation about a week back.
Woody 

[galfert]

the other bit i cant get my head around having just gone through the specs of this is the inclusion of the temperature perhaps there is a marketing purpose behind to bundle on . but it is what it is and seems like this reasonable entry to mid level product range is evolving quite rapidly but history of fine offset durability deters me ..once bitten twice shy..

No. this is covered in another post.  As I understand it, sound travels at different speed dependent on temperature (+/- 7% AFAIK)  so the temp readings are used to "correct" the wind speed.  One of our kind friends on here did post as full explanation about a week back.
Woody

Not only that but If you have a WS80 you don't have to use the temperature from the WS80 for your weather station. You can still have a different sensor in a more normal location be your station temp/hum.

[mauro63]

Yesterday a good result for ws80 about temperature data, very close to barani standard and a little better than vp2 

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Mauro

[galfert]

Mauro63,
What software are you using to plot the data of all stations into one graph? Are those just Excel graphs?

[mauro63]

Mauro63,
What software are you using to plot the data of all stations into one graph? Are those just Excel graphs?

I export data in txt and paste it on a simple Libre Office datasheet 
you can see better in data tab

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[galfert]

Ah okay thought so...Excel, Calc, same difference.   

[Mandrake]

As promised here is some comparison data for measurements taken during the first bit of significant rain we have had. (its been very dry where I live in Southern England)
It was however not particularly windy enough to drive rain through the sensors so I suspect the misreading's that folks have worried about did not occur. Wind direction readings in my location are not particularly reliable as its urban I cannot get the sensor high enough to avoid some swirl.

Standard Tri-Wing all-one sensor
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WS-80 Ultrasonic anemometer
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In general I think the readings look fairly good. I need to get up the ladder and adjust the WS-80 as the bracket is not great and it looks out of alignment already. Note the bracket supplied is not the one that will be shipped with production units!

[themarcus]

hi! others are testing the ws80? how is it going? 

[Mandrake]

So far I am impressed. The sensor seems more sensitive and less laggy than the traditional windcups which is not a surprise I guess.
There are a lot of comments that the traditional weakness of ultrasonic is strong winds and rain to distort the readings. So far I have not had any heavy weather here to gauge that issue as I have barely seen any rain since installing the sensor for test.

I am not sure how many other folks outside of Hong Kong are testing although I know Mauro in Italy has been testing and has been happy so far.

[mauro63]

So far I am impressed. The sensor seems more sensitive and less laggy than the traditional windcups which is not a surprise I guess.
There are a lot of comments that the traditional weakness of ultrasonic is strong winds and rain to distort the readings. So far I have not had any heavy weather here to gauge that issue as I have barely seen any rain since installing the sensor for test.

I am not sure how many other folks outside of Hong Kong are testing although I know Mauro in Italy has been testing and has been happy so far.

I can confirm,
my ws80 has a very good performance about wind against my Davis vp2, more sensitive, lower threshold, higher gusts
My wind test could not be very accurate, my vp2 wind sensor, and also, ws80 sensor is near the ground, at about 2,5 mt height
About temperature, obviously, the performance is not good at the same, there's a little overestimation during the day, with good solar radiation and low wind, little against my passive vp2 but more high against the ecowitt wh31 sensor inside Barani Meteoshield Standard, and more higher than my Meteoshield pro, but I think it's normal due the little dimensions of ws80 solar radiation shield and his poor quality
Obviously, we have an underestimation during night hours with sky clear, also due to the ws80 solar radiation screen quality.
the ecowitt products are very good for me, gw1000+ws80+wh40+wh31 in a good solar radiation shield and you have a very good system

Sorry for my poor English

Mauro

[Mandrake]

Thankyou Mauro, and my findings agree with yours.
My sensor location whilst higher is too suburban and is effected by nearby tall buildings and trees which cause swirl.
That said the Ultrasonic sensor still seems to perform better than the wind cups in every way so far.

[themarcus]

ok, thanks!