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Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Sat 23 Apr 2011 8:34 am
by steve
What condition are the batteries in when you take them out - what voltage do they read on a meter?
Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Sat 23 Apr 2011 10:30 am
by jlfutari
I don't have any equipment to measure the voltages/condition of the batteries. The battery's do work just fine in other devices.
James
Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Sun 24 Apr 2011 8:53 am
by AllyCat
Hi James,
Even "fresh" Alkaline batteries should deliver at least 1.6 volts (each) so the extra few hundred millivolts from the Lithiums shouldn't be a problem, but perhaps it's just enough to push your La Crosse "over the edge". Can you try any "part used" Lithiums?
The simplest test I can suggest is to temorarily replace ONE of the batteries with a charged AA rechargeable battery (Nickel Hydride or Nickel Cadmium). These deliver typically 1.2 volts which should cancel out any "extra" volts from the Lithium AA. But this is only for testing because you should not normally mix different types of cell, and generally these rechargeable cells are not suitable for this type of application because their "self-discharge" gives a poor lifetime.
If this test proves successful (or as an alternative test) connect a diode in series with the batteries (perhaps a "Schottky barrier" type if you are actually taking the trouble to buy one). The easiest place to do this is with some insulating tape at the "bridge" which connects the two batteries in the unit. A diode will drop about half a volt (a little less for the Schottky type a little more for a general purpose diode) regardless of the current flow (a resistor is no good because the transmitter draws pulses of current).
To check if the La Crosse unit itself is affected by the cold, you might try putting it in a fridge or freezer. The metal case of the freezer could block the radio waves, but a sufficient signal might get through the door seal.
Cheers, Alan.
Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Wed 29 Jun 2011 1:59 am
by Tallone
Hi all, new to this forum, I too had this problem, and owing to a lucky break I discovered the problem, you can forget the outside unit although the lithium batteries are a great idea for a variety of reasons.
The answer lies in the specs page of the manual !! for the WS2355 it will function down to -29.9 C. But look closely at the inside temp. range the lower end is shown as -9.9 C, keep in mind that this unit was designed in north America where the winter temperatures outside are enough to have the local brass Monkey crying in pain !!! but his owner lives in lovely warm home at the very least at around +24 C upwards ( I lived there for a couple of years and speak from personal experience.) I realized this a couple of day's ago when my WS 2355 started its winter performance when the outside dropped below 6C. and the INSIDE temp. dropped to below about 14.5 deg. on finding the link between the console and outside down and it would not restore by my carrying out the "re-sync procedure" ( depressing the + button until a beep sounds ) so I swung the small desk reading lamp around to illuminate the console screen for about a minute and tried re-syncing again, that was it, all was back to normal, later in the day I reproduced this by lowering the console temperature with "freeze" spray several times and the results were positive each time.
Last night I kept the lamp on and no problems!
Hope this helps those experiencing this problem.
Robert.
Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Thu 30 Jun 2011 8:57 pm
by ZL2AIM
I agree with Tallone.
Also new to this forum. I have a WS2355 and use it with Windows XP Pro SP 3. Using Weather Display software.
I experienced the dropping of information starting a few days ago. We are in the middle of winter here in New Zealand and I this is the first winter that I have used the weather station.
I have been seeing straight line graphs for temperature, humidity, wind direction over a period of about 6 hours at a time. This morning it had been reading the same information for over 5 hours when I noticed the La Crosse indoor display was not showing any data. The genuine INDOOR temperature was about 10 deg C.
I tried Tallone's suggestion of putting a reading lamp near the console and hey presto, as the temperature came up to 14 deg C, so the console came to life with the correct information!
Now, if only I could make sure that I don't get any 92 km/hr wind spikes and -9 Deg C spikes! That will be another thread.
Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Fri 01 Jul 2011 10:17 am
by Super-T
Sounds like you need a small lightbulb internally for a bit of heat?
Or turn on the heat pump
Re: La Crosse WS2355 in cold weather
Posted: Fri 01 Jul 2011 12:11 pm
by CheroKiwi
Kia Ora
You aren't that far from my brother. He is in Cooks Beach.
What software are you useing? I have Cumulus on xp and had a similar spike. I used cumulus to fix it - so far so good.
Ron
ZL2AIM wrote:I agree with Tallone.
Also new to this forum. I have a WS2355 and use it with Windows XP Pro SP 3. Using Weather Display software.
I experienced the dropping of information starting a few days ago. We are in the middle of winter here in New Zealand and I this is the first winter that I have used the weather station.
I have been seeing straight line graphs for temperature, humidity, wind direction over a period of about 6 hours at a time. This morning it had been reading the same information for over 5 hours when I noticed the La Crosse indoor display was not showing any data. The genuine INDOOR temperature was about 10 deg C.
I tried Tallone's suggestion of putting a reading lamp near the console and hey presto, as the temperature came up to 14 deg C, so the console came to life with the correct information!
Now, if only I could make sure that I don't get any 92 km/hr wind spikes and -9 Deg C spikes! That will be another thread.