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Weather Station Hardware => What Weather Station Should I Buy? => Topic started by: urdjur on September 14, 2020, 04:18:59 PM

Title: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: urdjur on September 14, 2020, 04:18:59 PM
Hi!

I'm new to this forum and not exactly a weather enthusiast. I was hoping I could rely on your expertise. My problem is simple: I would like to know when it will rain, or stop raining, in the immediate future, in my local area. Is there a device to suit my needs? To elaborate:

The weather apps on my phone or on-line forecasts don't seem to solve the prognosis problem I am interested in. It's not that the long term prognosis is uncertain (I don't really care about it) - it's that the "resolution" in both time and space is not fine enough. In fact, they don't even accurately predict rain in my area even when it's been raining for 30 minutes already. So I thought, perhaps a local weather station might help, but it is unclear from reading on-line reviews, how much they really improve local forecast ability and in what way.

I want to look at the upcoming 2.5 hours and know with great certainty, which of these ten 15-minute segments of time will include rainfall, and which will not. The area of interest is very local, in the order of 1 km radius. It matters greatly to me, if it will start raining in 15 minutes or in 45 minutes. Or if it will stop raining in 30 minutes, or chances are it will continue for another 2 hours - that makes a world of difference for the planning of my day.

Is there a weather station or other device worth investing in, if this is my only real interest/goal?
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: johnd on September 14, 2020, 04:40:55 PM
A weather station won't help you. You need to look at a good online rain radar service, but I don't know what's available in Sweden.
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: CW2274 on September 14, 2020, 04:41:09 PM
Is there a weather station or other device worth investing in, if this is my only real interest/goal?
No. A PWS will do nothing to acheive your goal. The only thing you can do do satisfy your preciseness is weather radar, and even that can be questionable depending on the areal coverage...or looking out the window.
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: urdjur on September 14, 2020, 04:47:46 PM
Thank you. I hadn't even heard about rain radar before, so that is certainly something to look into. :)
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: CW2274 on September 14, 2020, 05:02:19 PM
Thank you. I hadn't even heard about rain radar before, so that is certainly something to look into. :)
:shock:

Here's a sample from the northern Gulf of Mexico and hurricane Sally.

https://weather.cod.edu/satrad/nexrad/index.php?parms=EVX-N0Q-1-24-100-usa-rad#
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: ocala on September 14, 2020, 06:16:43 PM
Try a Google app called Rain Viewer. It covers most radar sites. Just looked and it covers Sweden. Find the closest radar site to your location. The app uses gps to determine your location so you can see when rain is coming. Observe it for a few days to get used to what direction the rain is coming from. Eventually you'll know what to look for when the skies turn dark.
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: Mattk on September 15, 2020, 04:10:27 AM
That's a very difficult one, especially to be that specific and expecting it to be correct?
Title: Re: Short term, local, accurate rain prediction?
Post by: Mandrake on September 17, 2020, 04:53:17 AM
Agree that using a weather radar site is what you want but that's not an exact science either.
I use PWT running on an Android Tablet and this displays my weather station stats as I want them and it also displays a URL of choice in a window.
In mine I use NetweatherTV for its rain radar.

However you need to understand that the Radar is showing moisture in the atmosphere and this does not always translate to rain/snow on the ground. It does give you a good indication however of the moving moisture. Where the intensity is higher then you can be sure that rain is contained in the cloud that will fall on you. These sites can also often show lightning strikes detected as a bonus.
Hope that helps