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RainFall OFFSET

Discussion and questions about Cumulus weather station software version 1. This section is the main place to get help with Cumulus 1 software developed by Steve Loft that ceased development in November 2014.
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CrasHBoneS
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri 06 Jan 2012 10:49 am
Weather Station: PCE-FWS20
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: Bellaria Igea Marina (RN)
Contact:

RainFall OFFSET

Post by CrasHBoneS »

Hi all, I have a PCE-FWS20 produced by Fine Offset Electronics Co. LTD (Honk Kong), also known as:
Fine Offset WH1080/WH1081,
Watson W-8681/WX-2008,
National Geographic: 265 NE,
Elecsa 6975/6976,
Ambient Weather WS-1080/WS-1090/WS-2080,
Tycon TP1080WC

I have a question:
almost every day the station measures 0.3 mm rainfall, probably caused by "moisture" in the rain gauge
example:
Today
Rainfall max. 0,3 mm at 08.06
Yesterday
Rainfall max. 0,3 mm at 08.08

This "apparent" rainfall, If I don't correct the value with Cumulus, produces wrong trends, wrong "day count with rain", wrong total rainfall, etc etc

My question is:
-Coul be added a new "offset parameter" related to rainfall (like pressure, temp. hum.) so I can set to -0.3 mm?
The actual rainfall multiplier is not suitable for my problem.
-There is a workaround?
Thank You very much.
User avatar
steve
Cumulus Author
Posts: 26672
Joined: Mon 02 Jun 2008 6:49 pm
Weather Station: None
Operating System: None
Location: Vienne, France
Contact:

Re: RainFall OFFSET

Post by steve »

You can change the threshold that Cumulus uses to record a 'rain day', by stopping it and editing Cumulus.ini. Add a line to the [Station] section

RainDayThreshold=0.4

Cumulus will then only record a 'rain day' when two tips of the gauge have occurred.

It is possible that in future I may add an offset so the amount doesn't get included in the total for that day.

Edit: You may need to make that

RainDayThreshold=0,4

I can't remember whether Windows uses regional settings for decimals in ini files - it probably does, just use whatever the existing settings use.
Steve
CrasHBoneS
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri 06 Jan 2012 10:49 am
Weather Station: PCE-FWS20
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: Bellaria Igea Marina (RN)
Contact:

Re: RainFall OFFSET

Post by CrasHBoneS »

steve wrote:You can change the threshold that Cumulus uses to record a 'rain day', by stopping it and editing Cumulus.ini. Add a line to the [Station] section

RainDayThreshold=0.4
......................
...................
I just read it in the Wiki;
steve wrote: It is possible that in future I may add an offset so the amount doesn't get included in the total for that day.
I'll be waiting for next release to solve this "problem"
Thank You
Spider-Vice
Posts: 207
Joined: Sat 24 Sep 2011 2:46 pm
Weather Station: Davis Vantage Vue
Operating System: Raspbian

Re: RainFall OFFSET

Post by Spider-Vice »

Well I don't really see this as a problem, as, theorically, dew is precipitation and I think it should be counted ;)
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geoffp
Posts: 322
Joined: Tue 28 Jun 2011 2:06 pm
Weather Station: Oregon Scientific WMR 200
Operating System: Windows 7
Location: Harwich, Essex
Contact:

Re: RainFall OFFSET

Post by geoffp »

This 0.3mm may also be the wind vibrating the pole to which the instruments are attached I had this problem until I moved the rain collector to a firm base. :bash:
Regards,

Geoff

WOW Site No. 147808
CrasHBoneS
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri 06 Jan 2012 10:49 am
Weather Station: PCE-FWS20
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: Bellaria Igea Marina (RN)
Contact:

Re: RainFall OFFSET

Post by CrasHBoneS »

Spider-Vice wrote:Well I don't really see this as a problem, as, theorically, dew is precipitation and I think it should be counted ;)
Thank You for Your suggestion
The 4 weather station (1 LaCrosse, 3 Davis www.bellarameteo.it) near to mine (http://meteobellaria.altervista.org) do not misure anything

I think:
1)"cold air" is "trapped" inside rain gauge and the air over the gauge is heated by the sun rising.
2)"cold air" "trapped" inside rain gauge cause the moisture on the air heatred by the sun rising
Image
geoffp wrote:This 0.3mm may also be the wind vibrating the pole to which the instruments are attached I had this problem until I moved the rain collector to a firm base. :bash:
The time the station register rain fall the wind speed is about 8 km/h, if the cause is the wind, I should register rainfall many times during the day but it is not my situation.

This is my rain gauge modded to avoid loss of rain due to low "wall" of the rain gauge
Image
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