Solar and UV sensors going off line - fix?

[aussiewmr]

Unfortunately the fix suggested by Fine Offset did not appear to work.
The unit did run until mid afternoon when it failed. I was able to reset and all worked again. So pretty mush the same failure mode. The fact it survived the morning was probably due to the fact we started off with a very overcast day in Brisbane East.
All details have been sent to FO and I am sure they will continue to try to fix this issue properly.

Regards
phil

[aussiewmr]

Back on my modified sensor today and it has run without issue.

Fine Offset are sending two replacements in return for me sending mine back for analysis etc. They are in constant communication and are very keen to solve this problem - very impressed

I will update with outcome when available.

Phil

[41south]

Finally had time to take apart one of my 2 replacement sensor units from FO. There are changes/upgrade etc.
First up there has been some re-work (or bad work) on the back of the UV (?) sensor - and the xtal is not soldered


Next is what appears to be a new PCB layout with an extra hole. Also a wire leading off down to the solar sensor



And this is the other end of the new wire - it shorts over a set of blank smd pads



I haven't had a chance to look at what these changes mean at a technical level, but assuming the one currently on my roof has the same mods it certainly fixes the problem. There are no markings on the pcb that I can see that provide any clue to a revision a,b,c etc but there is certainly a difference between the layout on my original one versus this one.

Cheers
Colin.

[aussiewmr]

That certainly is different to mine.
It will be interesting to see what my replacements are like. They were sent DHL a couple of days ago.
I don't think soldering the crystal matters, though its best practice to, and yes given that's "refurbished" they should have fixed it.
Phil

[41south]

Yes, this by comparison is my old faulty unit in that same area. I wonder if the link is all that they've done? I'm sure it's not that simple I'll email them and ask if it's possible to retrofit the mod.

[aussiewmr]

Hi Colin,

I am willing to bet that the third thruhole they have soldered the wire to is the same as the via beside the two thruholes in the second photo.

Phil

[Taylon]

Hello to you all,

Newbie here and I'm having problems with the Solar unit in my 3080 unit as well.

However, I might have just stumbled across the real problem with these units. When the batteries in the transmitter are over 3v the solar unit fails to operate and would also answer the question of why the units go offline after short while as the battery voltage goes down the unit would also fail to operate as the voltage operational range for the solar unit to work successfully appears to be very narrow!

The reason for the above observation is that I installed a single 3.5v long life cell as recommended in this forum in the transmitter instead of the supplied rechargeable cells. the Solar unit failed to operate. However, when the supplied rechargeable cells were fitted the solar unit burst into life and the screen displayed the solar readings. The rechargeable cells supplied are nominally rated at 1.2v, 2000maH each giving a combined voltage of 2.4v where the long life cells are 3.2v.

Thus the questions posed are: Does the transmitter and or the solar unit require better voltage regulation? If so how can this be achieved?

Hope to be able to read your replies and comments shortly.

Kindest regards, John R.

[JohnF]

Hi all
Just to update my situation. I received a replacement solar unit on 23 December and that seems to have solved the problem for me i.e ALL data has shown without any dashes since the 23rd.
Belated Happy New Year to all
John

[dpmiller]

Hello to you all,

Newbie here and I'm having problems with the Solar unit in my 3080 unit as well.

However, I might have just stumbled across the real problem with these units. When the batteries in the transmitter are over 3v the solar unit fails to operate and would also answer the question of why the units go offline after short while as the battery voltage goes down the unit would also fail to operate as the voltage operational range for the solar unit to work successfully appears to be very narrow!

The reason for the above observation is that I installed a single 3.5v long life cell as recommended in this forum in the transmitter instead of the supplied rechargeable cells. the Solar unit failed to operate. However, when the supplied rechargeable cells were fitted the solar unit burst into life and the screen displayed the solar readings. The rechargeable cells supplied are nominally rated at 1.2v, 2000maH each giving a combined voltage of 2.4v where the long life cells are 3.2v.

Thus the questions posed are: Does the transmitter and or the solar unit require better voltage regulation? If so how can this be achieved?

Hope to be able to read your replies and comments shortly.

Kindest regards, John R.

Hmm. Mine seems to show "low tx" and subsequently fails to transmit, somewhere slightly north of 1.4v

and aren't the supplied alkaline rechargables 1.5v?...

[colinpb]

I've been having an intermittent problem with my 3081 since I set up in mid-November 2011. It will lose data for around 30 minutes give or take then continue. Sometimes it will need another brief spell a little later, no specific times. After that it's ok for a couple days or so. I have attached a list of failures. My question is does the solar unit have its own timer, if so it looks like mines possibly on the blink. Other than that it's working well. And despite missing data I've managed to produce a good record, thanks to cloud occurring coincidentally at the times it goes off line during the day!

Regards

Colin

[Feek]

I bought a 'Watson' W8681-Solar from Waters and Stanton on Friday and put it up yesterday.

Initially the Solar and UV data was showing fine but at some point today they changed to just showing dashes on the console. I've used the down arrow reset but that's made no difference.

It seems this is a common problem. Am I best off calling Steve tomorrow at the shop to ask him for a replacement unit or is it worth pulling it all down and seeing if I can do a manual fix? The fix seems a little hit and miss.

I need to make some changes, at the moment I fixed everything together at the top of a 20ft pole mounted 8ft up on the side of the house but I think the rainfall sensor needs to be lowered as I'm getting readings when it's windy. Am I right in thinking the rainfall sensor should be on something as solid as possible?

My station is online at http://www.g6nhu.co.uk/wx right now.

[aussiewmr]

However, I might have just stumbled across the real problem with these units. When the batteries in the transmitter are over 3v the solar unit fails to operate and would also answer the question of why the units go offline after short while as the battery voltage goes down the unit would also fail to operate as the voltage operational range for the solar unit to work successfully appears to be very narrow!

Kindest regards, John R.

Hi John,

You might be onto something there.

I have been running a test for Fine Offset and my last test was putting in a link in a certain place. It did not work.

Then they wrote back and asked me to repeat the test which I did but I decided to run the test with my spare sensor (instead of the working setup I have) and used a second set of batteries on the spare Tx unit. This was to avoid my readings from the working unit failing. However the test solar did not fail like it did the other day (2 days in a row) but the working one did (this one has not failed since my resistor mod many days ago).

I have just measured the battery voltage in both Tx units and its very interesting. The working unit (that failed) is 3.22V and the test unit (that did not fail) is 2.82V. This lines up with what you are saying.

I have just turned off the test unit and installed it outside in my working setup (the one with the higher 3.22v) as I was earlier wondering if having two Tx units running at the same time might have interfered somehow, but maybe not if the battery theory holds. Something else to think about now

phil

[Feek]

If it's down to voltage, would swapping the 'Alkaline rechargables' for ordinary NiMH or Eneloops help? They're 1.2v cells so there's no chance of them going over voltage.

It depends on whether the charging circuitry will cope with NiMH cells.

[nigelran3]

Hi I run a Watson 8681 solar which I also had this problem station went up in July Last year and functioned fine until October the solar reading froze after a reset cleared ran for 2 hrs and the froze again after messing around for several day I gave up and left it with dashes, then in December we had a fall in temp to about 2c and the whole unit failed I removed the supplied batteries checked them and they appeared fine but would not function in unit replaced them with
a set of Duracells reset station all came up fine and solar unit functioning full ever since then.
the supplied batteries were put in a torch and work fine yet will not work on station so I get the same impression that they are over charging, and slowly shut the unit down starting with the solar readings and then the complete sensor I will keep monitoring the batteries and let you all know what happens hope this is usefull info

Nigel R
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/nigelran3/index.htm

[Feek]

Interesting, Nigel. Ordinary Duracells or rechargables?