Davis FARS Upgrade

Tornado Tim · Unread post by **Tornado Tim** » Thu 14/02/2013 16:26

As mentioned in the other thread, I have upgraded the unit to include a FARS to ensure temperatures remain accurate esp over summer and to confirm my suspicion that Matangi has a microcimate .

When buying the FARS I couldn't believe the price differences:
Davis NZ $239.20.
Scientific Sales NZ:$219 (Exc Shipping)
Scientific Sales U.S: $255.98 (NZ conversion inc Shipping) ($120 for Shipping Alone!)
Archer Trading Post: $172.74 (NZ conversion inc Shipping).

Scientific Sales U.S may be cheap on first look but boy do they sting you bad when it comes to shipping!

Anyway got the Item from Archer Trading Post and I asked how much another enclosure would cost and he threw it in free!
So I have a spare enclosure that could be upgraded to a extra temp hum or Soil moisture Station just by adding a PCB.
The upgrade didnt take long, it was the cleaning that made up most of the time it was out. I wish Davis thought a little bit more when designing the rain collector base, spiders love all those nooks underneath to nest in

Anyway here it is (Cattle included):

jamie · Unread post by **jamie** » Thu 14/02/2013 17:13

What does fars mean? Is it fan aspirated temp?

Tornado Tim · Unread post by **Tornado Tim** » Thu 14/02/2013 17:19

jamie wrote:What does fars mean? Is it fan aspirated temp?

Almost:
Fan Aspirated Radiation Shield.

David · Unread post by **David** » Thu 14/02/2013 17:33

Nice one Tim, looks exactly the same as mine now with the bigger radiation shield

Although my solar panel is quite different to your one.
By the way, my FARS still has the original fan motor... running without hiccup for 3 years 2 months.

Have you noticed faster response to temperature and humidity changes yet? Also, how many rechargeable batteries do you have to help power the fan? I use 1 rather than 2. Edit: (I'm not sure of this now, can't find the spare lying around so maybe I put it back in the FARS)

Michael · Unread post by **Michael** » Thu 14/02/2013 17:40

means farts,cows nearby

Richard · Unread post by **Richard** » Thu 14/02/2013 17:53

Neat set up Tim

Tornado Tim · Unread post by **Tornado Tim** » Thu 14/02/2013 18:09

David wrote: Have you noticed faster response to temperature and humidity changes yet? Also, how many rechargeable batteries do you have to help power the fan? I use 1 rather than 2.

Yes much more responsive to change

This one is a 12 hour FARS (doesn't run on batteries to power the fan), there are no kits of that will convert a 12 hour FARS to 24 Hour one. However the 12 hour FARS has some of the 24 hour Equipment already.

I know all the componentry for the 24 hour FARS can be bought on Archer Trading Post: http://archertradingpost.com, so it would be possible to upgrade from 12 hours to 24 hours. All that would need to change is the solar panel and add in the battery recharging PCB.

Tornado Tim · Unread post by **Tornado Tim** » Fri 15/02/2013 20:23

Here is a weather graph from today: (Temp, DP and Solar Radiation):
It responds very nicely

jamie · Unread post by **jamie** » Fri 15/02/2013 21:02

what do you mean its responding differently? doesnt something measuring something simply measure it or not?

David · Unread post by **David** » Fri 15/02/2013 21:08

jamie wrote:what do you mean its responding differently? doesnt something measuring something simply measure it or not?

With the fan directing air flow past the sensors, the sensors can detect temperature and humidity changes much faster.

Tim just wait until you get a low humidity day, the humidity and dewpoint lines on the graphs can get pretty erratic

Tornado Tim · Unread post by **Tornado Tim** » Fri 15/02/2013 21:12

jamie wrote:what do you mean its responding differently? doesnt something measuring something simply measure it or not?

With a normal aspirated shield the temperature and humidity the response time will be different due to fluctuations in temperature and humidity due to external elements (such as the sun, wind etc).
With a Fan the fluctuations will be picked up much more quickly and hence have a better response time to change.

Dave: You got to it before me, LOL

jamie · Unread post by **jamie** » Fri 15/02/2013 21:16

oh right. i get it now. im hoping to finally move my station this weekend. Lightning will be another weekend i suspect but no one will notice haha.

im hoping to get another anemometer for down here and a soil temp probe. soil temp will be very interesting i believe. the wind will be interesting to compare. Ground wind compared to the lightning rod i currently have. I assume i can display both meters on weather display?

Tornado Tim · Unread post by **Tornado Tim** » Fri 15/02/2013 21:36

jamie wrote: im hoping to get another anemometer for down here and a soil temp probe. soil temp will be very interesting i believe. the wind will be interesting to compare. Ground wind compared to the lightning rod i currently have. I assume i can display both meters on weather display?

Yes Soil Temp will be very good, esp in Winter.

I'm not sure you can have another anemometer with your current setup. From what I know about your setup you have a anemometer transmitter kit, that takes over your ISS (Integrated Sensor Suite) Wind port. I could be wrong but I believe it wont work that way.
The only other way I can see what your trying to do is buy an Envoy8x, and setup 2 ISS SIMS (One being your VP2 ISS and the other just being a enclosure with another ISS SIM board with the anemometer attached).

You then have the Envoy8x linked up to the PC with the SQL software running behind and get WD to work with that database.
I am not entirely sure about the Linkup between the SQL Software and WD, Brian would have much better idea on the interface.
The Envoy8x can take 8 ISS station simultaneously, and with each ISS you can have 4 soil temp stations etc....

You may be able to get the Envoy8x to repeat the signal and then you can put the console elsewhere.

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