Cumulus Support

Can anybody help me as to how I can connect the lightning sensor for this system (Tempest) to Cumulus please? I would appreciate any suggestions.

I think if I remember rightly you are using the HTTP (Ecowitt) station setting to get data to CumulusMX from your Tempest. In which case as with mine it arrives as an Additional Sensor on your Admin Interface.
If you are not using this station type you will have to set it up as an additional sensor in the Additional Sensor Settings using the "Use a HTTP Station for extra sensors" and then it will appear in Additional Sensors.

Thanks for reaching out. Unfortunately I am not familiar with the processes you describe. Could you flesh this out a bit more or am I asking the wrong question?

OK my bad. I assumed that the weathers tation used an HTTP protocol and that was how it was added to the list of supported stations. It turns out it is a separate station type which set in the configuration.

Therefore the lightning sensor must appear in that protocol for CumulusMX and it is not clear from I can see that it does. Therefore I think you need to PM Doug Summersgill User name (jokerboy) and ask him if it is part of the code he added to CumulusMX to process Weatherflow Tempest weather stations.

I just had a quick look at the Tempest station code, and support for the lightning sensor is already there.

Yes, the Tempest will send lightning info to CumulusMX.

There is one thing to note on the Tempest though. The Tempest App (iPhone, Android, and web) apparently shows lightning info from tempest stations nearby, not just your local tempest. This can be confusing when trying to compare CumulusMX to the tempest app.

Doug

I have my Tempest working well with CMX. I have another instance that has been running with my Vantage Pro2 for about a year.

I haven't figured out how to enable the lightning detection. If I look at Extra Sensors, display there is a section for it without any data. I searched through the settings and the Cumulus.ini file and found nowhere to enable it. Lightning detection is not an add-on sensor for the Tempest, it comes standard so I am assuming it is addressed somewhere.

Am I missing something, or should this be a feature request? I use CMX extensively, and the main reason I got the Tempest is for lightning detection, although so far (2 days) it has been pretty impressive when compared to my Davis readings. Being able to track lightning data in CMX is pretty critical for me.

The Tempest station automatically receives lightning data.
To log lightning data, you must enable extra sensor logging: Station Settings | Common Options | Extra Sensors: Log extra sensors

I double checked, and Log Extra Sensors is enabled

OK, so you have had a lightning strike and it hasn't been recorded?

I don't think lightning is being logged.
You can log it by using custom logs but CMX only displays lightning in the extra sensors when the sensor is activated

The above to the best of my knowledge.

Yep, my bad, you are right. It isn't logged in extra sensors, the data is just displayed.

mcrossley wrote: ↑Thu 27 Apr 2023 7:25 pm OK, so you have had a lightning strike and it hasn't been recorded?

Yes, 3 strikes today showing on the Tempest app. Nothing in CMX

If you switch on debug logging and either simulate a strike or wait for a real one, then we can see in the MXdiags log if CMX is receiving lightning packets from the station.

The code implies that summary lightning data is also available in observation packets - count and average distance - but it does nothing with that. Only the live lightning packets that are sent when a strike occurs are processed.

ahagadorn wrote: ↑Thu 27 Apr 2023 8:31 pm Yes, 3 strikes today showing on the Tempest app. Nothing in CMX

And these were definitely registered by your station and not strikes that the app is pulling in from nearby stations? I'm not sure how you tell the difference.