Topic: Opinions on WeatherFlow smart weather stations?

[galfert]

I'm surprised that someone hasn't stolen it yet!!!!! 

Probably because it just looks like a used up Brita filter. A little larger but still.

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[vreihen]

Probably because it just looks like a used up Brita filter. A little larger but still.

I always thought that the design resembled a, ummm, muscle relaxer device formerly marketed by Hitachi, but to each his own..... 

[galfert]

I can see that too now that you bring it up. It was a pretty magical device, so I've heard.

[weather34]

hmmmm its getting amusing now 

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[tweatherman]

Weather34,
How long have you had your new Tempest for?

Thanks,
tweatherman

[weather34]

i dont own one but i see identical issues that were all present in the previous product called sky , that being the big one rain related issues , i never understood or could fathom out why they continued with this approach regardless it was raised consistently to them over the last two years . i also really am alarmed that there forum for a new product called tempest  is just full of all the common issues that were raised to them in the previous sky along with some new teething ones . seriously this low cost component haptic approach is terrible it just doesnt work consistently and ill stick my kneck out and say avoid this product until they change the approach they have had two or more years to resolve it and nothing has changed or improved . in my view consistent relative readings within a reasonable tolerance are the basic requirement of a weather station however i accept things can go a bit awol when some diverse weather turns up on your doorstep like a snowstorm,hurricane,tornadoes etc but on non diverse normal days i would expect something relative in return for what you see outside the window in the backyard etc..
only real advances ive seen from the tempest over the sky is the improvement on the temperature related sensor readings but the rain performance is just “ugly” .

[ocala]

So I guess a loud thunderstorm could also set it off?

[tweatherman]

Very interesting!

tweatherman

[Vertikar]

They apparently did try and make some improvements with the haptic rain sensor by isolating it more from the rest of the unit, I'm assuming with some elastic material. Not sure how it panned out.

I've got the original unit, and for the price, I'm pretty happy with it. It really does struggle in light rain though, generally to the point of not reporting it. Unfortunately I haven't got a manual or tipping gauge to compare against at the moment.

[galfert]

I just picked this up from a FB conversation:

I have to say, I spent $330 and bought the new fancy WeatherFlow Tempest weather station, no moving parts, used scientific AI to configure the data and such, looked really impressive... Has a lot of impressive features too. Well it’s rain “gauge” is flawed. Instead of collecting water it uses vibrations and it’s called a Haptic Rain Sensor, tells the exact time it started and stopped and the depth of rain thru pressure.
So we had a bad rain event here and it only showed .52” rain that night, my CoCoRaHS manual gauge had collected .70” in it, and then the next day the Tempest changed it rain amount to 1.55”!! So I eMailed them and said how can my Wx Station change in 8 hours from .52” to 1.55” when my manual true rain gauge only shows .70”?? I said I run a local Skywarn organization for the NWS in my area I need ACCURATE real-time readings not delayed flawed readings. That night I hooked my Ambient WS-2902 back up! I love my Ambient 2902!

That thing is a joke. It is cute ...I'll give it that. But it isn't a real instrument. If all you are going to get is AI rain data then why even bother having a weather station. You can get overall rain data averages for any area without a station. Yet many people buy this things....I just don't get it.

I don’t either. I mean it does have an impressive list of features it displays, but it’s flawed, an AI can’t give you weather results, and when I wrote them to say I’ll be returning it I found out that the reason my Tempest jumped from .52” to 1.55” in 8 hours is cuz they crowdsource the other Tempests in the area and the AI feeds the data based on what those other stations average. I said that’s total bullshit, you guys are meteorologists you should damn well know the rain at MY location won’t be the same at another location a mile or 2 away... That’s when I decided to dump them and I have to package it up to return it now. Unless I sell it.

[ocala]

Pretty damming.

[CW2274]

they crowdsource the other Tempests in the area and the AI feeds the data based on what those other stations average. I said that’s total bullshit, you guys are meteorologists you should damn well know the rain at MY location won’t be the same at another location a mile or 2 away...

AFAIC this is a case of "pulling the wool" over unknowing eyes. They know that all this AI and such will be a carrot stick for those who like gadgets and most will be clueless on the "limitations" of said design. Frankly I personally don't care, unless they post their crap online...which is probably about 99.9% that do.

[Bushman]

Pretty damming.

Yeah, one review and time to dump it.  LOL

[tweatherman]

I’m still sitting back and watching all the reviews. I was really liking what I was hearing from a lot of reviews.

Thanks,
tweatherman

[CW2274]

Pretty damming.

Yeah, one review and time to dump it.  LOL

Yeah, you betcha. It's an extremely flawed way to gather reliable data.

[weather34]

if you have about a month to spare go read there forum its riddled with issues from day one .
i can not fathom why weatherflow as a company with a good historic professional background fail to acknowledge the rain measurement via their haptic design is totally flawed . this has highlighted to them since early 2018 in the initial consumer product called SKY yet here they are with a second generation 2 years on with a product called tempest and its riddled with problems.

my own far afield observations from day one

a vertical solar panel has upto 40% less efficiency and to make that worse the capture area is relatively small ,so what you will see is seasonal replenishment problems under all scenarios be it cloud,tree cover,landscape elevation and so on. what makes it even worse is they have a threshold setting no user its fixed where if voltage is low wind sensor , rain sensor will shut down.

remember it is an all in one so there is some trade offs  those being any of these wind,temperature,rain,solar replenishment .

rain measurements to sum it up its awful and unreliable to any enthusiast who cares about accuracy and keeping logs of data. time and time again they think rain start or onset of rain is a unique feature well i can think of nothing worse than seeing inaccurate realtime data and this rain check thing is a scam as far im concerned might as well just download an app from an app store .

uv sensor is problematic like all low end low cost uv solutions there is a so called calibration which basically connects to there servers and gets fudged .

lightning sensor in the tempest raised my eyebrows and think its safe to say lightning data you see is not always what is detected there is third party source inflating the figure. but having said that i can see its usefulness in awareness of probability of a storm.

the tempest product relies on being able to connect to there servers however for the advantageous out there disable or connect it to a local router without  internet access as the product can simply be used over a local network and sit back for aweek or so and draw your own conclusions on what the tempest unit is actually measuring without any influence,corrections,manipulation from another source.

having had full access to two installations i drew a conclusion over a few months that there is some method a data manipulation coming into play and what is displayed is not always realtime hardware data.

as an hobbyist/enthusiast this would drive me nuts having become accustomed to having un manipulated realtime data that at times doesn't need an internet source to function.i.e power outages,internet outages everything i use aka Davis with a nanosd still fully functions under outages .

weatherflow are a innovative company that just aint got it right and when you see quotes of field testers “ they are super busy sending out replacements “ the word “replacements” rings alarm bells .. i still hold hope for them that  they are to produce a reliable product with a separate rain gauge in the form of tipping or weight measurement but haptic method is abysmal.

fwiw im not a weatherflow basher just dismayed that soon after the tempest was released,dispatched to the backers of their campaigns the all too familiar issues that were highlighted way back in 2018 in their first generation product were basically present in the 2nd generation tempest along with a few new ones.

beware some will only say good things to keep their relationship with weatherflow in tact but there is no harm in critical if its valid .some will not hear of anything critical of the product and some will refuse to hear that their $300 innovative product is not living up or performing to expectations .


for me personally i refused to get involved in this second generation testing but i strongly suggested them to send a test unit to justin aka jgentry the trusted respected source to me anyway on here of testing the sht31 with the baking method but they didnt . if they had i would have mentioned a few other trusted  knowledgeable sources on here to really help them iron out the finer points..


if your into home automation then this could be what your looking for...
 

[ocala]

Pretty damming.

Yeah, one review and time to dump it.  LOL

Go to their forum and read about it.  There are a lot of issues. Maybe you didn't see it that way.

[mihec]

if you have about a month to spare go read there forum its riddled with issues from day one .
i can not fathom why weatherflow as a company with a good historic professional background fail to acknowledge the rain measurement via their haptic design is totally flawed . this has highlighted to them since early 2018 in the initial consumer product called SKY yet here they are with a second generation 2 years on with a product called tempest and its riddled with problems.

my own far afield observations from day one

a vertical solar panel has upto 40% less efficiency and to make that worse the capture area is relatively small ,so what you will see is seasonal replenishment problems under all scenarios be it cloud,tree cover,landscape elevation and so on. what makes it even worse is they have a threshold setting no user its fixed where if voltage is low wind sensor , rain sensor will shut down.

remember it is an all in one so there is some trade offs  those being any of these wind,temperature,rain,solar replenishment .

rain measurements to sum it up its awful and unreliable to any enthusiast who cares about accuracy and keeping logs of data. time and time again they think rain start or onset of rain is a unique feature well i can think of nothing worse than seeing inaccurate realtime data and this rain check thing is a scam as far im concerned might as well just download an app from an app store .

uv sensor is problematic like all low end low cost uv solutions there is a so called calibration which basically connects to there servers and gets fudged .

lightning sensor in the tempest raised my eyebrows and think its safe to say lightning data you see is not always what is detected there is third party source inflating the figure. but having said that i can see its usefulness in awareness of probability of a storm.

the tempest product relies on being able to connect to there servers however for the advantageous out there disable or connect it to a local router without  internet access as the product can simply be used over a local network and sit back for aweek or so and draw your own conclusions on what the tempest unit is actually measuring without any influence,corrections,manipulation from another source.

having had full access to two installations i drew a conclusion over a few months that there is some method a data manipulation coming into play and what is displayed is not always realtime hardware data.

as an hobbyist/enthusiast this would drive me nuts having become accustomed to having un manipulated realtime data that at times doesn't need an internet source to function.i.e power outages,internet outages everything i use aka Davis with a nanosd still fully functions under outages .

weatherflow are a innovative company that just aint got it right and when you see quotes of field testers “ they are super busy sending out replacements “ the word “replacements” rings alarm bells .. i still hold hope for them that  they are to produce a reliable product with a separate rain gauge in the form of tipping or weight measurement but haptic method is abysmal.

fwiw im not a weatherflow basher just dismayed that soon after the tempest was released,dispatched to the backers of their campaigns the all too familiar issues that were highlighted way back in 2018 in their first generation product were basically present in the 2nd generation tempest along with a few new ones.

beware some will only say good things to keep their relationship with weatherflow in tact but there is no harm in critical if its valid .some will not hear of anything critical of the product and some will refuse to hear that their $300 innovative product is not living up or performing to expectations .


for me personally i refused to get involved in this second generation testing but i strongly suggested them to send a test unit to justin aka jgentry the trusted respected source to me anyway on here of testing the sht31 with the baking method but they didnt . if they had i would have mentioned a few other trusted  knowledgeable sources on here to really help them iron out the finer points..


if your into home automation then this could be what your looking for...
 

I agree with all your points. I've had the 1st generation since it was released. (Too) many issues to convince me that the station is a replacement for a Davis. Not even for the cheapest station I own which costs 1/3 of the WF price. Despite reporting obvious issues with rain and especially with wind readings continuously, no clear explanation was given by their staff. Replacements are not really a solution because eventually same problems pop-up. I received few Sky replacements and all show wind measurement issues. The Air is fine, no complaints.
I'm sure the 2nd generation is using same sensors but with more issues on power supply. Why would I compromise the readings if there is not enough sunlight to charge the batteries? I'm happy I didn't get involved into 2nd generation.
Data manipulation is another reason why I don't want this station anymore. I want to log the temperature, humidity, pressure, rain, lightning strikes and wind on my location. I'm not interested in "other sources". I can check the web for other sources myself.

[cpufrost]

New Year fireworks registered light rain at midnight here! 
Sky was clear, nearly full moon in tow.
The sensor is like that, impulse noise is going to be recorded as raindrops.

[Bunty]

It been 2 1/2 years since the last posting.  Have the Tempest stations been fine tuned for better accuracy with rain by now?  If it hails on them, is it recorded it as rain?

[ValentineWeather]

I have a couple of them now, one is mounted near the airport ASOS and the other at my place. The haptic rain sensor itself isn't accurate but WF has software that adjusts to surrounding stations so in the end doesn't look that bad. If you were able to watch prior to the adjustment say during the rain event you can see they overcount badly as much as triple sometimes. The rest of the features are pretty good like air temperature and if you don't mind the software adjustment on rainfall for the average Joe, not bad units.

[cpufrost]

Reliability is my biggest issue.

 My first unit was purchased in December of 2020.  In June of 2021 I noticed its firmware was quite old compared to others.  I emailed support and they said they needed to replace it as they identified an issue.  It was producing readings that were within its operating limits.  A few days later and some climbing I swapped it out.  This was peak of brood X and I even had a cicada land on my arm and start singing which freaked me out.  But a quick cell popped up and I heard thunder so I got wrapped up and was done.  Or so I thought!

Next AM I noticed the UV was 0 and we had bright sun.  Status showed UV failed.  I opened a ticket and they remote rebooted and then most of the sensors were no longer working.  They said the lightning from the storm yesterday may have fried it but I know from in the past having a tree not 30 feet from the tower getting bark peeled to the ground from a strike had no effect on my prior unit.

So a few days later, up and down the tower and Tempest number 3 is flying high.  That one worked well up until the end of last September.  The battery voltage was dropping fast after a few days of no sun.  It would recover to 2.8 but as soon as the sun set it was back to 2.5V.  Next few days of overcast it was down to 2.4 and then the report rate gets dropped to save power and it finally went offline.  They replaced that with number 4 which (again) was put up.

On April 22, during a quick gusty shower, the barometric pressure showed a sudden drop of 5 inches of mercury!  We were nowhere near any tornadoes for sure!  Of course it's borked again, in the ticket they indicated they would sending out a replacement.  This will be number five.

It's getting old fast and I do all climbing/rigging myself but make no mistake about it, I don't enjoy it!

This unit constantly reports rain events during most wind events over 15 mph.  Of course towers and hardware are quite "chatty" when it comes to acoustics, which the rain sensor is based on.  (It's a $.80 piezoelectric transducer found in most annoying beeper type alarms)

TEMPEST number SIX was installed on a roof tripod mast early May.  One June 24 it went AWOL.  I was out of town.  When I returned I power cycled the outdoor unit and it did connect but its battery was very weak and was in slow mode.  It did recover after a few days of full sun.  I opened a ticket with WF support and they said it looks OK now that it has recharged.

On July 7th we had a gully washer thunderstorm.  I noticed the barometric pressure was off again as before.  Nearly six inches lower!   I opened a ticket with WF.  They told me they have a new and improved unit that will be arriving by the end of the month if I wanted to wait or they could send a replacement right away.  I opted to wait.  They claim the "new and improved" unit features fewer connection points inside and an insect screen to keep pests out of what I'm assuming is the temperature shield area.  It's supposed to be here by the end of the month so we'll see.  I'm done with putting it up on the tower!

I suppose I have too high of an expectation for an all in one solution coming in around $300 USD.

The only good thing I can say is their support is outstanding.  The unit is past its 2 year warranty period and they pay for shipping both ways and haven't asked for a dime.  They also help out in a timely manner with things like calibration issues, et al.
 
If this is something you put on a post by your garden, then no problem.

On a roof, better be prepared (and comfortable) using a ladder frequently!

You can see in my sig links to both TEMPEST and Ambient Weather 2000 systems.  The AW is about $25 cheaper than the TEMPEST and produces decent results and has had zero issues since I put it up last November.  It's on the same tower but much lower.

My biggest concern is with (presumably) 100s of thousands of these (TEMPEST) units reporting from all over the globe, a HUGE amount of data, what good is it if it's flawed!  It's not just the rain that has accuracy issues.  Wind at times is just plain wrong.  I've had the anemometer showing a constant 20 mph breeze in fog whereas the other real instruments are showing 0.0.  Flying insects like sweat bees and even lady bugs traveling in the sensor gap will wreak havoc with the wind often showing gusts of 30-40 mph on days where the real wind never exceeds 10 mph.  The anemometer also seems to be extremely sensitive to flow that's slightly off axis.  Other ultrasonics, particularly professional units (eg. Vaisala) have never had such issues.  I know I'm comparing a Rolls Royce to a Pinto but you get the idea.

[Bunty]

Reliability is my biggest issue.

My biggest concern is with (presumably) 100s of thousands of these (TEMPEST) units reporting from all over the globe, a HUGE amount of data, what good is it if it's flawed!  It's not just the rain that has accuracy issues.  Wind at times is just plain wrong.  I've had the anemometer showing a constant 20 mph breeze in fog whereas the other real instruments are showing 0.0.  Flying insects like sweat bees and even lady bugs traveling in the sensor gap will wreak havoc with the wind often showing gusts of 30-40 mph on days where the real wind never exceeds 10 mph.  The anemometer also seems to be extremely sensitive to flow that's slightly off axis.  Other ultrasonics, particularly professional units (eg. Vaisala) have never had such issues.  I know I'm comparing a Rolls Royce to a Pinto but you get the idea.

I don't blame you for your concern.  My small town has 6 Tempest stations online with 5 more rural ones.

And then the OKC metro appears to have well over a 100 of them.