Wind Shield - Rain Guage

Hi,

Due to the location of my wind sensor (top of the hill) I have to install my rain gauge up there also. I have prevented North wind interference by place the rain guage down the hill a little (on the south side), west is protected by Pine trees, but south and east are very exposed and we often get strong SE winds with rain. It comes straight up the hillside. So I setup this wind shield to help stop underreading as the result of the wind … I was wondering what other opinions are … will it work or could it actually make underreading worse (e.g. create an uplift over the rain gauge) ?

Ignore the torn plastic and the bent posts … if I decide to keep it I’ll be re doing it all stronger. It has taken a bit of a battering already !

The shield is about 1 - 1.5 metres away from the gauge and the top of the gauge has about a 30 degree angle to the top of the plastic shielding (should be no shadow problems).

The ones I have seen look like picket fences that are a couple of feet away from and a couple feet higher then the collector.

That’s an Alter Shield http://www.novalynx.com/260-952.html#top

I think those Alter Shields can be pricey. How about a plastic snowfence? Something like they have around the test site at Grand Rapids, MI:

http://www.crh.noaa.gov/grr/snowsensor/

Can’t afford an alter shield and I don’t know how they would go being mounted on a slope anyway. That snow fence looks like it might be an idea though. I’ll look in that, thanks. :slight_smile:

I was referred to this topic regarding how to block air around a rain guage.

I don’t know if you can still buy that kind of snow fence, but the modern equivalent seems to be even a better solution and has given me an idea :redhotevil:

The more modern type is plastic that has a bunch of holes punched into it. So instead of having the vertical spaces like that type, the whole thing is perforated.

They were trying to block wind from blowing snow in and drifting over their snow depth guage. Depending on the location, the drifting could blow snow away or pile it up so they would need a way to prevent either thing from happening. Blocking the wind for their reasons is similar to blocking the wind for rain guage purposes.

Lew