It would make sense there are differences in the capabilities of the different rain sensing approaches.... I can't claim to be across the nuances of these... I'm just a software and data guy.... 
Personally all I really ask of my weather station is an indication of "it didn't rain".... "it rained a bit...", or "it rained a lot". So far my old-school cup-style sensor does the job... I will probably buy a Wittboy or something newer if/when I need to...
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If anyone is interested, as an experiment today I put one of my multi channel temp/humidity sensors in my gun safe, it works just fine in there! So if you are looking for something to monitor in a signal damenping environment, these are an option.
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after doing the debugging in the other thread regarding the wn34d I noticed there was a new attribute coming out.. runtime
I assume this is the uptime since last reboot as it seems to reset when you reboot the device.
Therefore i added code in my driver to report this as uptime on the parent device..
you can look at my github for my version here and figure it out
but here are the changes:
attribute "status", "string"; // Display current driver status
attribute "lastUpdate", "string";
attribute "dynamicIPResult","STRING"
attribute "upTime", "string"
}
then
case "runtime":
def ut = formatUpTime(it.value)
attributeUpdateString(ut, "upTime")
break;
case "endofdata":
// Special key to notify all drivers (parent and children) of end-od-data status
updated = sensor(it.key, it.value);
then
// lgk format updatime
def formatUpTime(runtime)
{
def uptimeString = ""
Long ut = runtime.toLong()
Integer days = Math.floor(ut/(360024)).toInteger()
Integer hrs = Math.floor((ut - (days * (360024))) /3600).toInteger()
Integer min = Math.floor( (ut - ((days * (360024)) + (hrs * 3600))) /60).toInteger()
Integer sec = Math.floor(ut - ((days * (360024)) + (hrs * 3600) + (min * 60))).toInteger()
if (days > 0)
uptimeString = uptimeString + days.toString() + " days, "
uptimeString = uptimeString + hrs.toString() + " hours "
uptimeString = uptimeString + min.toString() + " minutes, "
uptimeString = uptimeString + sec.toString() + " seconds"
return uptimeString
}
// Recycle bin ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/*
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Hmmm.... I thought I already had this or something similar.... Or just ignored it.... Will check it out after work. Thanks.
i will check if so ignore me and i will delete the commend.
you are right you process the attribute but are just storing the integer instead of converting to readeable days hrs etc..
but that is your choice.. sorry to bring it up.
Question about the piezo rain sensor.
I have the HP2560 console with the WH90 combo sensor that uses the piezo sensor for rain.
I also hesitantly bought the Stratus rain gauge to "calibrate" my piezo.
I also have the WH40 rain gauge.
I am trying to get all of them to sort of agree, and the WH40 and Stratus are very good, BUT the piezo is WAAAYYY off.
I have tried to set different gains and got it close, but it is still rather bad.
FYI my rain gains are:
1.6
1.9
1.8
1.2
1.2
These numbers seemed to get things closer but still alot farther off than I would think.
Have you tried to cal your piezo? and what numbers worked for you?
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That's why I stick with the old school WH40 see-saw style of rain gauge, even just a coating of scale can reduce their accuracy. The only downside to the old school type, is you need to check them occasionally to make sure the funnel isnt blocked with leaf debris and spiders haven't made a home inside the cavity.
3 Likes
I agree.
I have a Davis VP2 and I have found the rain gauge (tipping bucket) is starting to read high....
Maybe 0.7 actual and 0.87 indicated.
I have had problems in the past with it and it was the reed switch that was bouncing.
They run very low current through the contacts and after a while, they become "bouncy", proven with a scope, and don't make good contact when the magnet passes the switch.... Time to R and R the switch.
I just thought with all the rave about the piezo rain gauge, I would try it out.
But it is becoming more of a toy than something that can be relied on.
I will just use the WH40 which is a tipping spoon. It is not a see-saw though... there is only one spoon that pivots.
Still a "real" rain gauge!
2 Likes
I couldn't think of a better description - tipping spoon is what I was thinking of.
Gotch ya! I knew what you meant but wanted to make sure of the difference.
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I don't have a console now, I just use it with the GW2000 gateway, the ecowitt app and hubitat. I plan to add a console soon. While I would like to get the 2560, it will probably be one of the cheaper ones.
I already had the Wh40, i just left it in the mix i figured it would be interesting to compare the two. Sometime the WH 40 is ahead of the piezo, sometime the piezo is ahead of the WH40. A little over half the time they agree. I havent calibrated the piezo. Last summer when I added the wh40 mid-year I offset the total with the reading from a USGS rain gauge a few miles from my home.
I haven't done any kind of study into the differences. The only thought I had as to the differences was the type of moisture. I suspect the piezo isn't as good at detecting mist, whereas the cups are. I think at the end of 2023 the difference between the two was around 1.4 inches (the was the cups over the piezo. So far for 2024, the piezo is ahead by .11 inches. I didn't include the USGS offset when I set up the Wittboy, but at the end of December 2023, the Cups registered 3.22 inches for the month whereas the piezo registered 2.72 inches for the month. There was a lot of mist near the end of the month.
Overall, that is not enough for me to be too concerned with it.
That reminds me I need to get eh ladder out and take a look. I need to get a set of bird spikes for it as well as a spare funnel. When i was remounting it a few months ago, the funnel fell out and landed in the cow pasture behind us. I spent about 20 minutes hanging over the fence trying to grab ahold of it and get it back. Now i think it would just be easier to keep some spare parts around.
2 Likes
Forgot to mention that I also added a GW2000.
Were your results with the piezo, using the "factory" default cal values of 1.0 for everything?
If not, is your piezo set for?
The difference between the piezo and the spoon kinda drives me nuts, so I will just use the spoon (WH40) and rely on that since it matches my "manual" rain gauge.
The Davis I will work on replacing the reed switch because I was using that as a reference before I bought the rain gauge.
Found out that even the Davis was incorrect! So all my "calibrating" for the piezo went out the window.
My rainy season is almost over, but I think we have a "storm" or two coming so I can get a cal in or two.
I know I am pretty anal about the accuracy of my equipment, and have come to realize that the piezo technology is still "learning" and the tipping buckets/spoons are the tried and true method.
Thank you for the reply though!
Yes. The only adjustment I made was to the Wh40 last year to account for rainfall prior to its installation, other than that, everything is at factory settings. The differences don't bother me much. I find it interesting to watch one be ahead of the other during one rain event, but then another event they will be reversed. That is why I think the TYPE of precip affects the piezo, specifically it does not measure mists very well. It seems like the precip needs a certain force when hitting the membrane for the piezo to register it.
Our first rainy season is about to begin. We usually have one in April -May, then again September-October.
Thank you for your reply!
I am having a rain event as we speak, and the 40' is keeping up with the rain gauge, and I am tweaking the piezo to match and got it pretty close.
I will use the 40' for my display and upload since it is accurate and the piezo is "well.....".
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I think I can almost confirm my theory. Over the last In 24 hours we have had 2 inches of rain. At one point yesterday the WH40 was about .05 behind the wittboy. As the rain let up and it became more drizzle and mist the difference was reduced to about .01.
2 Likes
@sburke781 I'm not sure what happened but my UDP Relay for my Weatherflow stopped working last night after my router rebooted and came back up. I verified the iP is correct in my container and verified that the UDP is gathering data... Somewhere between the container and the Hubitat hub it's not making it through. I'll work on it more in the coming days, but just wanted to verify that nothing has changed in the drivers / app coding that would have disabled this correct?
I can always tell immediately in the morning when the system is offline. All my lights come on inside the house when I go from room to room because lux isn't set correctly (usually zero from the night before).
Hmmm... Nothing springs to mind at first glance. I can maybe take a closer look at the weekend if I get time.
I assume the sensor sync was something you initiated?
Yes
I think the first thing will be to work out, which you may have done already, if data is getting to HE at all.... I would normally, temporarily, update the Device Network Id of the gateway device and then see if error / warning logs appear in the HE logs saying it can't find where to send the data received on port 39501.
If the data is making it to HE, then there is definitely something weird going on.... But my guess is the issues lies in getting the data to HE, and is unlikely to be related to any driver changes (though I'm not ruling it out entirely).
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I may try setting it up again in the future but for now I’ve Moved over to using Snells weatherflow driver and moved away from the UdP relay in an effort to get my home back to normal. When I get some time I’ll revisit it.
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