Author Topic: WH3080 support  (Read 9156 times)

WCDev

  • WeatherCat Developer
  • Administrator
  • Storm
  • *****
  • Posts: 2911
    • CW9739
    • ISCOTLAN25
    • Trixology
  • Station Details: Main Station: Vantage Pro-2, 24hr fars, solar, soil/leaf station, extra temp stations, no U.V. WeatherLink IP.
WH3080 support
« on: February 16, 2013, 12:31:14 PM »
For the past two weeks I've been running a WH3080 here whilst implementing support for it in WeatherCat. Now this unit cost me ?90 (approx. USD140 at current exchange rates) and the quality of the construction is what you'd expect for that kind of money - it looks serviceable but is a bit flimsy. In particular, make sure the rain bucket is mounted on a stable surface, not the pole they suggest you to mount it on in the manual as it will vibrate in the wind and cause false rain readings!).

I've been running it side-by-side with a Vantage (approx. ?1000 as configured here) and apart from the differences in update rate (48 seconds on the WH3080) it tracks pretty well - for the money it's probably the most impressive weather station I've seen. I can't say anything about the long term reliability of this unit, but in the short time we've had it, it hasn't missed a beat - no missed transmissions, no weird behaviour, even the transmissions from DCF77 were picked up! (Many of the stations here that are supposed to pick it up, don't).

There is one issue - the console can display the solar radiation as lux, foot-candles or watts per square meter - the watts per square metre display is off by a huge factor so don't expect an accurate solar radiation reading in W/M^2 on the console (WeatherCat corrects for this and tracks nicely against the Vantage's reading of solar radiation).

It may be we got a particularly good unit, I don't know, but if you're looking to get into the hobby on a budget and are looking for solar and u.v. this is probably the best bet at the moment. (Note, you will need to buy or create some kind of radiation screen for it - the external temperature and humidity are affected by strong solar radiation)

Ours came from Amazon under the Watson branding: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Watson-W-8681-SOLAR-weather-station/dp/B005BBJQ1M/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1361016771&sr=8-1


WeatherCat version 1.14, which supports the WH3080, will ship shortly.


jace

  • Storm
  • *****
  • Posts: 812
    • DW9675
    • ISuffolk62
    • Yoxford weather site.
  • Station Details: Davis Vantage Pro2, with Mac USB Data Logger. 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook, with 8 GB 1033 MHz DDR3 Memory, running Mac OSX Version 10.10.1 (Yosimite).
Re: WH3080 support
« Reply #1 on: February 16, 2013, 02:17:04 PM »
That's interesting, could almost be worth saving up for and using as a stand-by system for periods were the main station could be off-line for periods of repair or maintenance.

Shame, it's a year late for me, could have saved a lot of beer tokens instead of buying the Davis.  [beer]

 [cheers1]
JC

elagache

  • Global Moderator
  • Storm
  • *****
  • Posts: 6494
    • DW3835
    • KCAORIND10
    • Canebas Weather
  • Station Details: Davis Vantage Pro-2, Mac mini (2018), macOS 10.14.3, WeatherCat 3
"Wouldn't you really rather have a Davis?" (Re: WH3080 support)
« Reply #2 on: February 16, 2013, 10:48:33 PM »
Howdy Stu, JC, and WeatherCat fans,

Shame, it's a year late for me, could have saved a lot of beer tokens instead of buying the Davis.  [beer]

When you wrote this, I couldn't help but think about the Buick sales slogan of the 1960s: "Wouldn't you really rather have a Buick?"

I have a feeling that these stations may work well, but as Stu described, they are very lightly-built and simply won't go the distance.   Sure, you can just replace them over and over again, but there is a hassle factor in replacing parts and a frustration in the downtime while you get your station going.

Already we have had a few of the WeatherCat faithful with other stations upgrade to Davis.  It wouldn't surprise me if Davis has a large fraction of its customers coming from previous owners of stations like Fine Offset.  These stations allow people to wet their appetite for weather data.  The folks who really like this sort of things, then go on to make the investment that seemed outrageous when they first got interested.

That's what happened to me with my Oregon Scientific 968.

Sure am glad Stu that you are adding support for these stations.  Once you bring them on board,  . . .  ;)  they are putty in our hands!!    . . . . . . Err, I mean we can give prospective station owners some friendly unbiased advice!

Cheers, Edouard  [cheers1]

fred_fraggle

  • Calm
  • *
  • Posts: 1
Re: WH3080 support
« Reply #3 on: August 28, 2013, 09:32:14 AM »
Hello

I have a Watson w-861-Solar unit -  as mentioned in the Amazon link above  - and just wanted to confirm that if I set up Weathercat to use the WH3080 settings, in the weather station comms set up, I will be getting the best data etc...

I also note that I am unable to download any historical data (from the last week or so) from my weather sensor desk base unit. The bit I am plugged into with the USB lead.
Also I can not clear any data already stored. 

Any one have any advice with setting this unit up and getting the best out of it from a data position? Maybe these are features to come in a future release maybe?

Thanks in advance




WCDev

  • WeatherCat Developer
  • Administrator
  • Storm
  • *****
  • Posts: 2911
    • CW9739
    • ISCOTLAN25
    • Trixology
  • Station Details: Main Station: Vantage Pro-2, 24hr fars, solar, soil/leaf station, extra temp stations, no U.V. WeatherLink IP.
Re: WH3080 support
« Reply #4 on: August 28, 2013, 04:44:08 PM »
Yep, 3080. If you're not getting any historical data when WeatherCat starts up, try resetting the console (power off, remove the batteries, power it back up and set the date/time).

Cheers,
Stu.