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Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Discussion specific to Fine Offset and similar rebadged weather stations
apple8
Posts: 129
Joined: Sun 21 Aug 2011 2:26 am
Weather Station: Davis Vantage Vue
Operating System: Windows 10
Location: Sydney. Australia
Contact:

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by apple8 »

Don't beat your self up, most of us have been there.
Cookie
Posts: 5
Joined: Mon 14 Jan 2013 8:50 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset
Operating System: Windows
Location: New Zealand

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by Cookie »

All was going well (with diode modification and insulation tape over the two sensors) then the tape fell off and it locked up. So which sensor is the Lux sensor? I plan to cover this one only.
AllyCat
Posts: 1124
Joined: Sat 26 Feb 2011 1:58 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset 1080/1 & 3080
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: SE London

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by AllyCat »

Hi,

The small white dome to the right of the sloping PV panel.

Cheers, Alan.
Cookie
Posts: 5
Joined: Mon 14 Jan 2013 8:50 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset
Operating System: Windows
Location: New Zealand

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by Cookie »

If you place a 1M ohm resistor across the UV sensor I think you will get about a 47% reduction in UV reading.

This is my thoughts on it from reviewing the Reyax UVI-01 spec's. I have made two assumptions, the sensor in use is a UVI-01 or similar device and the circuit is loading the sensor at the recommended value of 1M ohm.

I would be very interested in the results, I have no way of calibrating the sensor myself.

Grayden
brett
Posts: 7
Joined: Fri 02 Jan 2015 10:34 am
Weather Station: WS-3081
Operating System: Win 8.1
Location: Sydney

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by brett »

Sorry for resurrecting this thread but I have a similar issue, although mine has just become a problem..... after what might have been the better part of 3 years, I can't recall (it was probably one of the early AU units)

It may actually not be the same issue as the solar pod crash, but I tend to think it is - but it may also be influenced by some other factors I'll note below. Here's my observation and troubleshooting.

Just before Christmas the UV and solar values had disappeared from the console - since I don't currently have a PC on 24x7 and am not using Cumulus, I didn't see disappear from any logged data. Then, before I could get to look at the remote unit, the TX battery light came on and then a day later the whole thing stopped transmitting. Pulled the whole unit down and cracked it open.

First look showed me that there was some corrosion visible on the internal RJ sockets on the transmitter unit, specifically in the "rain" connection. The plug also showed a bit of corrosion on the surface - a scratch around with a knife and things improved, connected it up and resynced (and this forum helped immensely in shortcutting that process!) and seemed working. More fool me, because I stopped at that and went and put the unit back up - a week later, I'd noticed UV had gone again. Pulled the lot down again (lucky it's been quiet over the holiday break) and went to town opening everything I could.... and found my first curve ball. Battery leakage.

After cleaning up as much as I could, I replaced the batteries with some nimh rechargeables, which may not be the best idea after more reading here, and all started working OK again. Not to be fooled twice, I ran it for a few days on the office desk, and seemed fine again, so out it goes. Bzzzt. Next day, UV and Solar offline.

Bought the lot back inside, wanted to truly dissect the transmitter to find what else might have been damaged, that's when I really started reading threads here about this and this thread, but the failure condition still didn't match sufficiently to worry me. Couldn't get the case of the TX unit open after my (obviously feeble) efforts, so again I cleaned up the rain plug and socket and hoped for the best. Put it outside and it worked fine for the day, and the night, and I thought again, yay, solved (or solved to buy me enough time to soften up the CFO for a Davis purchase). Anyway, next day, solar and UV offline, and that's when it struck me that this failure that I'm now seeing, 3 years late, might be the same as the processor overload scenario mentioned here, and the battery leak is either a consequence of the pod crash excessively stressing the batteries, or just an unrelated, unlucky failure.

I haven't matched what the actual affected pins are on the corroded socket to the function, but the symptoms I see are that as the solar / UV increase in the day, things work fine, and then later in the day I find them not working; the transmit LED on the solar pod doesn't blink any longer, but functions such as wind and rain are still working as expected even though they're connected to the TX or in the case of rain are connected to the solar pod itself and relayed into the TX over that socket. And if the solar pod was still functioning but the signal pin was affected, I'd expect the LED to still flash as it tries to transmit.

So I am pretty sure I now just have a dodgy solar pod, and I'll head over to ebay and buy a replacement from Oz Weather Center, but am I safe to assume that this will now be a "new" batch that no longer has this ? Does anyone think the extra shading over UV/Solar would be worthwhile trying as an extra proof point ? (I'm not that attached to looking at those values anyway - so I think I probably will do that test to make sure my $40 isn't a total waste).
AllyCat
Posts: 1124
Joined: Sat 26 Feb 2011 1:58 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset 1080/1 & 3080
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: SE London

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by AllyCat »

Hi brett,

I wonder if anybody really knows the answers, maybe not even the guys at FO. I would hope that at least the "Excessive Lux" and "Unearthed Crystal" bugs have been fixed now, but who is to say what "old stock" might still be sitting on a shelf somewhere?

Generally, I agree with your comments, except that your problems might still be due to corrosion, and the following:
brett wrote:the battery leak is either a consequence of the pod crash excessively stressing the batteries, or just an unrelated, unlucky failure.

IMHO it might not be either "stress" nor "unlucky", but simply that "Rechargeable Alkaline" is fundamentally a cr@p technology. Only used by FO because it's cheap and (notionally) 1.5 volts per cell. I would never buy RA cells and might even replace those supplied with something better, if I had any concerns about reliabilty.

NiMH replacements are fine if you can accept the limitations of their 1.25 volts (in UK I'd use the "low leajkage" type to get over the darker winter). Alternatively, use one LiFePO4 (Lithium Iron Phosphate) rechargeable AA (14500) cell combined with a "placeholder" (short-circuit) cell which, together deliver 3.2 volts. They generally need to be imported from China but can be found locally as a "Replacement for Garden Solar Lights" (checking that they are not simply low capacity NiMH). Sadly, the paranoia about "Lithium" cells has created airfreight/shipping restrictions, even though LiFePO4 may be one of the safest and most rugged technologies.

So, I'm not sure I'd spend $40 on a new Pod (yet) when the station can be used without the pod (plugged in) and the rain cable inserted directly into the vacated socket.

Cheers, Alan.
pactrpo
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu 01 Jan 2015 2:17 am
Weather Station: WH3081
Operating System: Windows 7
Location: Hamilton Hill

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by pactrpo »

at the moment Altronics here in Australia have this station the WH3081 is on special for $119 down from $199, cat number x7062a.

Ive bought 2 and took one of the solar pods apart.

The UV sensor looks different. It looks like a clear top hat type of body.
On the solar pods PCB it has WHP0112A0V04 2012-06-07

The main console has Batch no: 03/13. in both the tx'rs and the consoles it has QC sticker with 04/13.

I think they must be getting a newer type of station in as just before new year it was also on special but went back to $199 for about a week then back down to $119.
uncle_bob
Posts: 505
Joined: Wed 17 Aug 2011 2:58 pm
Weather Station: WeatherDuino Pro2
Operating System: 2008
Location: Canberra

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by uncle_bob »

pactrpo wrote: down to $119.
Must have some good margin on those :)
Interested in building your own Weather Station? Maybe check out the WeatherDuino Pro Project Here
Conder, Canberra Weather
Image
sergios
Posts: 8
Joined: Sun 08 May 2011 8:14 pm
Weather Station: watson w8681 solar uv
Operating System: Windows XP SP2
Location: Greece

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by sergios »

I move last summer the station to another place. For 5 days the uv and lux work fine. Later again dushes. I make a "trick" with capacitor and work only for 4days and the lux sensor stack at 499. Later i open it again cause it goes again --- and i remove the "trick capacitor". Work fine for a month and again ---. I see that goes to dush when it have sunny days and temp over 33celcious. Now, here where i live they make some changes in rf tv. I go and reset it from pod. It working fine. I suggest do not open the solar sensor. Put a white tape. I believe the problem is rf, high temperature stack inside the pod. The best way is to reset the pod again and again.
aurion45
Posts: 20
Joined: Sun 22 Jan 2012 5:30 am
Weather Station: WH3081
Operating System: Windows 8.1, Raspbian
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by aurion45 »

Hi all, fix my Solar & UV, but purchasing a new Transmitter and Solar & UV units.

Purchased from SS_Trading in Queensland they're the Reseller for Australia.
Owner email address: sjg_xu@yahoo.com.au Steve Xu
Their web site: http://ss-tradings.com.au/
To purchase the 2 new units cost me $60.00 plus Freight of $8.00
Just email Steve your weather station Model requesting what you want, then Paypal him, via this email address: ss_tradings@yahoo.com.au
Put in the Paypal comment box it for Eg: Wh3081 Transmitter and Solar & UV units & freight.
Fast delivery had it in 2 day's.

My weather station works like a charm now, and has not missed a beat.
It has the new diffused window over the left hand side looking at the solar unit.

Hope this help everyone.
Andrew
P.S. Sorry "Steve Cumulus Author" it was a fault transmitter and Solar & UV unit.
Live_Steam_Mad
Posts: 10
Joined: Mon 19 Mar 2012 5:32 am
Weather Station: WH1081
Operating System: Win 10 Pro
Location: Moss Bank, St.Helens, Merseyside, England

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by Live_Steam_Mad »

basetman wrote:I just wanted to share my experience with the Watson W-8681-Solar weather station, which is a rebranded FO WH3081.
I have been using this station since April and apart from the solar and UV sensors going offline I have not experienced any other serious problem.
The solar and UV sensor were working fine fow about a week, then the console started losing the signal from these sensors and displayed "---". I resetted the transmitter and the receiver several time but thw sensors would work for acouple of hours and then they go offline again...
I tried to ground the oscillator crystal, as it was suggested in the first post of this thread.
Nothing changed. Then I replaced the rechargable alkaline batteries that came with the station with NiMH batteries, but again with no success.
Before about a week I tried another suggested solution. I added a 3300μF capacitor at the point Zed_Man suggested earlier in this thread.

https://cumulus.hosiene.co.uk/viewtopic.p ... &start=100

It seems to have done the job!!! The sensors have been working continuously for 6 days! I keep my fingers crossed, but the problem seems to have been solved! The accuracy of the light sensor is not that great (they are about 20% off), but for a 120€ weather station that is to be expected... The UV sensor was way off the official UV values for my region (12 instead of 6), but I applied some tape over the sensor and at least the maximum values agree!

Great program by the way, Steve! Keep up the good work!
I see that your Watson W-8681-Solar (FO WH3081) PWS seems to be working fine ;-

http://www.wunderground.com/personal-we ... M3#history

have you had any trouble with it over the last 6 months?

Where is the best place to buy one of these from in UK? Anyone know? I have a FO WH-1081 (Maplin N96FY) that has worked great for more than 6 months now but I'd like to have solar and UV graphs as well.

Regards,

Alistair G.
Jaeger
Posts: 1
Joined: Sun 19 Feb 2017 12:39 am
Weather Station: WH-3081
Operating System: Raspbian

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by Jaeger »

I've had my WH-3081 for several years now, and it's been mostly trouble free - except for ants building nests in it.

After evicting the ants from the rain gauge yet again (only a few, but they gum it up with "silk"), the transmitter wasn't working.
I tried swapping the batteries etc. It seemed to be working, but failed again overnight.

It seems the culprit is the solar pod. If I plug it in, the LED lights up as it should, but no solar/UV readings are received - and the transmitter stops working. There were some crazy rain readings, which makes me suspect it's sending bad data. (The battery voltages seem fine.)

I've unplugged it for now to keep the rest of the sensors working, but will pull it apart and check the crystal etc. suggested elsewhere.
AllyCat
Posts: 1124
Joined: Sat 26 Feb 2011 1:58 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset 1080/1 & 3080
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: SE London

Re: Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

Post by AllyCat »

Hi,

The rain sensor has a simple hardware "loop through" to the main transmitter, so you can plug the Rain Sensor cable directly into the Transmitter for testing (or even permanently if not using the Solar Pod). An intermittent connection (or more likely low impedance or mositure) across the cable or contacts (and of course movement of the sensor) can cause "fake" rain. Resetting the transmitter may reset/change the rain counter, leading to a gigantic spike in the rain data, but Cumulus is arranged to normally "ignore" this.

The Solar Pod has its own microcontroller (but not radio transmitter) so it sends a completely separate data packet directly to the radio stage in the Transmitter. Normally the two transmissions are "interleaved" (I don't know how this is achieved) so that the separate data packets never "collide", but obviously a faulty Pod could hijack the radio link and block all transmissions (but IMHO it's unlikley to create false rain data).

Presumably you are aware that when making any changes to the Transmitter/Pod, such as replacing the batteries, (un)plugging the Pod or pressing the "Reset" button (again I've no idea what that actually does), then you must resynchronise the Console by holding in the <down-arrow> button for ~ ten seconds.

Cheers, Alan.
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