diy solar

diy solar

Does an off grid weather station exist?

I don't want to side track the OP, but I've been pondering a weather station for quite a while. The linked product says "no moving parts" but the pictures show a spinny anemometer. I don't understand that.
Brother we been through the gamut with weather stations. Trust me if you want one there is only one way to go Davis Pro vantage 2. Expensive yes, but almost 20 yrs later still up and operating.
 
The tempest weatherflow doesn't have any moving parts ... you must be looking at some other vendor/model?

Davis is good stuff ... it is expensive, and (to me) feels somewhat that they are "resting on their laurels". It is a tier upwards for me ...

I don't have all the answers, but the tempest seems good for models in its price range, which is way below the davis and associated options. In that lower price range, many other models with moving parts always had parts failures, or display failures, or ... I hope the tempest, which I've had up and running almost a year now, holds up ...
 
Brother we been through the gamut with weather stations. Trust me if you want one there is only one way to go Davis Pro vantage 2. Expensive yes, but almost 20 yrs later still up and operating.
Totally agree. Davis way cheaper in the long term. Also for accuracy and reliability, nothing can beat them. I have had several fine offset type stations and replacement components in the past. Generally they work for a short time but then become troublesome and unreliable. You get what you pay for and in my opinion Davis is more than worth the expense.
 
Totally agree. Davis way cheaper in the long term. Also for accuracy and reliability, nothing can beat them. I have had several fine offset type stations and replacement components in the past. Generally they work for a short time but then become troublesome and unreliable. You get what you pay for and in my opinion Davis is more than worth the expense.
So my anemometer bearings are shot (10 yrs). On hold for 45 min still no answer left message no return call after 24 hrs so things may be changing for the worse at Davis Imstruments.
 
That system is way too rich for my blood. It looks like I have the choice of really expensive and hope it can figure out a way to communicate or cheap and really REALLY complicated to log data while I'm at sea.

I'm not trying to track tornados, I'm just curious about how much I'll need to overpanel and if wind is worth playing with.

Sigh...
 
So, the tempest weatherflow is indeed solar-powered, for the outdoor part of the unit. It transmits wirelessly to the indoor ac-powered unit, and from there, you decide where the data is going. I use a simple pc with WeatherDisplay software to send it to various internet weather sites, who store the data long-term for me, and, WD also updates a local db for me.

While the outside data-collecting unit is solar-powered, and can be placed advantageously for your camp, the inside hub piece and the pc piece would need a black box that you build to house it and power it for a year. This doesn't seem hard to me, and it could be expandable into other services for your camp (can also provide power to other needs).

Ultimately, the black box consists of what you are willing to stick into it ... the pc piece can be a "windows mini pc", of low power draw. the tempest "hub" piece is wifi. a mini-wifi (usb stick) will go into the windows mini pc. All of this sits in a thermal/weatherproof box of your choice, powered by a mini-inverter, battery-bank, panel(s) that you whip up, like a diy solar generator.

My little pc runs for weeks at a time, if I don't use it for something else ... I'd bet it could go to months, years, especially if you stuck a "watchdog" function of some kind into the black box. If not running, get it running.

Still seems possible to me ...
 
That system is way too rich for my blood. It looks like I have the choice of really expensive and hope it can figure out a way to communicate or cheap and really REALLY complicated to log data while I'm at sea.

I'm not trying to track tornados, I'm just curious about how much I'll need to overpanel and if wind is worth playing with.

Sigh...
Forget the wind anyway, spend the money on panels.

Forget the weather station unless you want to spend big $$$$. Been there, all I use mine for now is wind direction, humidity/dewpoint and temp. Every other function hasn't stood the test of time. Bearings do fail, the rain gauge will catch crap and quit.
 
I came across the "KestrelMet 6000 Cellular Weather Station" today randomly.

It's f-off expensive but it seems to be totally offgrid
 
I came across the "KestrelMet 6000 Cellular Weather Station" today randomly.

It's f-off expensive but it seems to be totally offgrid
Requires cell service, got none of that out there.

To put it in perspective, it's an hour each way to a hardware store. ?
 
Requires cell service, got none of that out there.

To put it in perspective, it's an hour each way to a hardware store. ?
Ah sorry mate

Sounds like here (45 min). Cell and spotty point to point internet service came in last year. A neighbour actually started an ISP.
 
No (fuel) generator required ... all solar. The solar generator provides all, because all weather/computer components are *low-power* to start.

If mine runs weeks without touching it, you can build things so it runs months ...

Build/test everything "here" (wherever that is) ... if it survives a month to your satisfaction, haul it to the camp ...
 
I would say,
cheap weather station plus Star-link plus small solar set up to power it all.
you're away overseas more than half the time, you need to see the data, not wait to collect the data on site. Starlink will get you comms. small pv system will get you power to run everything, cheap weather station will collect and supply the data you want.
Otherwise,
use PV watts and pick the closest available weather station to your site, and then adjust for what conditions you may have locally (trees!)
EDIT: Full disclosure, this posting was sent via Starlink connection. LOL. maybe I am bias.
 
Oh no, I'm allergic to kids. That's why I got fixed for my 27th birthday. ?

I'll look into it.
It sounds like getting "fixed" was a unique and meaningful birthday gift to yourself. Celebrating your 27th birthday with a decision that reflects your personal choices and values can be a powerful way to mark the occasion. If you ever want to share more about your experiences or need advice on celebrating special occasions in unconventional ways, feel free to ask! ???
 
If you have a good quality charge contrioller, they are usually designed for up to 25% overpaneling. I started a Morningstar 60A/600V mppt up with 4050Wpv. 3200Wpv nominal. 4500Wpv max. 60A going into battery most of the day. No fans. I will always overpanel for Dec/Jan/Feb.
 
I have a Davis Vantage Pro2 - totally wireless communication with base station from the sensor suites. With Weatherlink, plugs straight into computer. I don't use the Weatherlink software but Cumulus MX instead which communicates directly with the Weatherlink dongle. No internet etc required.
I use davis equipment too. It shows all the information you could want on the base station part of it and requires no internet. You can also run a program called weewx on a local computer and it will store all of the history information. If you have internet it will feed the information to any of the weather services you want to feed to but it will work happily offline too.
 
Tycon TP3000WC.

Gotta power the base station. Easy to do with dc to DC converter. Stores gobs of data including irradiated.

$78.95.
 
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