Vantage Vue - WeatherLink

[Timelord]

I was very disappointed  to find that my shiny new Vantage Vue did not show average daily wind, gust max or gust average. One of the main reasons for a weather station is surely wind readings.

Can any user of WeatherLink tell me if the Vantage Vue supplies these important wind records?

Thanks in advance

John

[NorCal Dan]

For the first part of your question, from the Vue Console Manual:

Press WxCEN multiple times to scroll through all the wind-related Weather Center screens, which include:
•   Maximum Wind Speed — Displays the highest wind speed recorded for the
day. Includes the time the speed was recorded.
•   Last 10 Minute Gust — Displays the high wind gust in the last 10 minutes with
the direction of the highest gust displayed in degrees.
•   Average Wind Speed — Displays the average speed over the past two minutes
and over the past ten minutes.
•   Beaufort Scale — Toggles between a description of the wind speed and how the
wind ranks on the Beaufort Scale. (See “Beaufort Scale” on page 44 for more
information.)
•   Wind Direction — Displays the current wind direction in degrees.

I do not run Weatherlink so I can't help you with that...recommend you skip that program and try Weather Display. 

[teal]

Hi, I second that WD is the best.


   teal.

[Timelord]

Yea, I agree about WD, but if the wind data is not recorded than I am not spending nearly two hundred quid just to get data that is missing vital weather information.

Hi gust in the last ten minutes is useless to me, I like weather watching, but I am not spending the rest of my life watching the Davis consul and pushing the WxCeb button every ten minutes!

It's kind of you guys to reply to my question, the problem is the question was about Vantage Vue AND WeatherLink, not what is the best software to use.

John

[Budgie]

I think you'll find it hard to locate a weather station that records average gust. A gust is an 'instantaneous' wind speed averaged over about 3 seconds so producing an average throughout the day is a tall order, even for software. It's not something I've ever seen the UKMO use but I've been wrong before. 

The daily average wind speed is calculated within Weather Display, but I don't know if the WeatherLink software does this as well because I don't use WeatherLink. 
The max wind speed that the Vue manual refers too will be the max gust for that day as this will be the highest recorded wind speed. 

[prodata]

NOAA monthly reports in Weatherlink gives you daily mean wind speed IIRC.

And I'd echo that it is worth reading through in detail the section of the Vue console manual that deals with the WXCenter - there is a surprising number of different parameter min/max and mean values reported there. Of course, there will always be particular, less commonly used statistics that aren't available but coverage of most summary values is pretty good.

[NorCal Dan]

Yea, I agree about WD, but if the wind data is not recorded than I am not spending nearly two hundred quid just to get data that is missing vital weather information.

Hi gust in the last ten minutes is useless to me, I like weather watching, but I am not spending the rest of my life watching the Davis consul and pushing the WxCeb button every ten minutes!

It's kind of you guys to reply to my question, the problem is the question was about Vantage Vue AND WeatherLink, not what is the best software to use.

John, with weather data it's all about the software.

[Weather Display]

WD is written by a weather enthusiast, for weather enthusiasts

[Timelord]

John, with weather data it's all about the software.

Oh, you are so wrong NorCal Dan.

With weather data its all about the data!

I agree with everyone that WD is the best weather ANALYSIS software in the world. But in order to Analise the data you need data. If the weather station does not record the data then even WD cannot present that data.

My question still stands, but I will modify it for those people who seem not to understand.

Does the Davis Data Logger record wind speed at preset intervals and does it record wind gust at preset intervals?

And is it therefore able to present that data to WD for analysis?

[Budgie]

The wind speed is updated every 2.5 seconds, the same as the VP2.

[JaxWeather]

I was very disappointed  to find that my shiny new Vantage Vue did not show average daily wind, gust max or gust average.

John,

Based on that you are asking about software as all of those would be the results of analysis of the data collected, averages are analysis not raw data...

-Bob

[prodata]

OK, Vue wind data 101:

The Vue ISS generates a new wind speed and direction value and transmits it to the console every 2.5625 seconds (on channel #1).

The Vue console receives this packet and translates it into two very distinct types of data record for transmission to a PC:

1. A real-time or LOOP packet is generated by the console approximately every 2 seconds containing the latest available wind speed/direction values and, if requested, passes this to the PC via the logger interface;

2. The console also generates an archive record at the end of each archive interval which contains the mean wind speed and dominant direction in the interval plus the maximum gust speed and its direction seen in the interval. This archive record is stored in the logger until download of a block of such records is requested by a PC. The archive interval is set by the user at some value between 1 and 120 minutes.

NB The latest firmware can make available additional wind values, but let's avoid additional complexities for now.

The above describes the wind data generated by the console/logger combination. What happens to the wind data then depends totally on how it's processed by the PC software in use. If the software is looking only at the real-time data (ie [1] above) then it must make its own rules for averaging and summarising the data from the individual loop packets. So it's true to say that this depends totally on software. IF the software also (or instead) reads the archive records or is able to ask for and analyse the latest F/W packets then the wind data available will vary, but will still totally depend on how the software filters and processes the results.

So the Vue is excellent at making available the individual raw data values or at summarising them according according to its own fixed rules, but it's always possible that a user might prefer the data to be summarised or presented in a  different way.

[NorCal Dan]

Oh, you are so wrong NorCal Dan.

With weather data its all about the data!

I agree with everyone that WD is the best weather ANALYSIS software in the world. But in order to Analise the data you need data. If the weather station does not record the data then even WD cannot present that data.

My question still stands, but I will modify it for those people who seem not to understand.

Does the Davis Data Logger record wind speed at preset intervals and does it record wind gust at preset intervals?

And is it therefore able to present that data to WD for analysis?

As everyone here has told you, the Vue does record wind direction and speed.  And the Vue console does tag the highest reading to store in it's memory.  The datalogger will only hold a little over 2 days worth of data when recording at 1 minute intervals, and holding raw data from the sensors and passing it to the console (on request) is all it does.  If you want finer resolution you need software.  The software allows you to record data in real-time, as well as manipulate that data to form conclusions, ie. wind gust. 

[Timelord]

Thank you so much Prodata.

Finally an answer that makes sense and supplied me with the information that I originally asked for.

John

[ukwoody]

Actually, what Prodata has just told you in the long complex way you demanded, is exactly what everyone else told you as well.

As far as I am concerned, judging by your very abrasive unappreciating manner, I'm surprised anyone bothered, and I will guess will be unlikely to again.

Have I written that with enough complexity for you to understand, or is that too simple for you as well?

Woody