Which weather station?

[Musashi (Niel Gerryts)]

After three years my DIY weather station needs some maintenance and I’m considering replacing it with a proper commercial weather station (more durable, can measure higher wind speeds). The South African market is very limited but I can source from the UK in December.

It seems there are three main methods to integrate:

1. The ambient weather binding can retrieve information from the Ambient Weather online service.
   • Seems relatively straight-forward to set up
   • Only works for Ambient Weather stations
   • Requires internet connection. Not a big problem but not ideal.
2. The Fine Offset binding works with a wider range of weather stations
   • Ecowitt stations seem slightly cheaper
   • Can run local only
   • Seems complicated. I don’t know what the wire protocol is or how to set it up.
3. IPObserver
   • Local only
   • I think I can figure out the setup
   • It’s not clear what models are supported or exactly what IPObserver (ObserverIP?) is.

If you were to invest in a weather station today, what would you choose? Any ideas on the above (and alternatives to the above) would be much appreciated.

[Chiuaua79 (Cor)]

I went with Davis, which is top of the line I think… in OH 2.5 there was still a Davis binding, but I have my station connected to my RPi with a meteostick which has a binding that still is suppported.

Benefit is that Davis is quite modular. I started with a anemometer and later on added outdoor temp/humidity sensor. But this brand has so much more to offer.

Negative: very costly.

[KlingsporC (Christian Klingspor)]

I’m using Davis Vantage Pro. No Davis binding in 3.X but I have a RPi running OH 2.5 with only the Davis binding feeding my OH 3.X through the Remote OpenHAB binding.

[seattleneil (Neil Ostroff)]

I’m happily using an Ambient Weather station (WS-2902C) that can be configured to push weather data via HTTP GET to a custom IP address. In my setup, I’ve installed WeeWX running on a Raspberry Pi and use the WeeWX interceptor driver (configured with device_type = observer) to listen on TCP port 8001 for the weather data. To get the weaher data into OpenHAB, I’ve configured the WeeWX MQTT extension to publish the weather data to a mosquitto MQTT broker, with OpenHAB subscribing to the WeeWX weather topics. Here’s an example of what gets published by WeeWX:

weather/loop {"dateTime": "1667262300.0", "usUnits": "1.0", "pressure_inHg": "29.415399999999998", "outHumidity": "95.0", "inHumidity": "53.0", "outTemp_F": "46.2", "inTemp_F": "69.1", "windSpeed_mph": "0.04", "windDir": "349.0", "windGust_mph": "1.1", "windGustDir": "349.0", "radiation_Wpm2": "0.0", "rain_in": "0.0", "UV": "0.0", "txBatteryStatus": "1.0", "altimeter_inHg": "29.777091656736673", "appTemp_F": "44.97706205075705", "barometer_inHg": "29.782891264279204", "cloudbase_foot": "642.3588145674222", "dewpoint_F": "44.847621215903345", "ET_in": "5.6082773614307925e-05", "heatindex_F": "44.985", "humidex_F": "46.31768009283141", "inDewpoint_F": "51.23860608607752", "maxSolarRad_Wpm2": "6.327947341202209", "rainRate_inch_per_hour": "0.0", "windchill_F": "46.2", "windrun_mile": "0.0033333333333333335", "interval_minute": "5.0", "hourRain_in": "0.0", "rain24_in": "0.8500000000000001", "dayRain_in": "0.409"}
weather/dateTime 1667262300.0
weather/usUnits 1.0
weather/pressure_inHg 29.415399999999998
weather/outHumidity 95.0
weather/inHumidity 53.0
weather/outTemp_F 46.2
weather/inTemp_F 69.1
weather/windSpeed_mph 0.04
weather/windDir 349.0
weather/windGust_mph 1.1
weather/windGustDir 349.0
weather/radiation_Wpm2 0.0
weather/rain_in 0.0
weather/UV 0.0
weather/txBatteryStatus 1.0
weather/altimeter_inHg 29.777091656736673
weather/appTemp_F 44.97706205075705
weather/barometer_inHg 29.782891264279204
weather/cloudbase_foot 642.3588145674222
weather/dewpoint_F 44.847621215903345
weather/ET_in 5.6082773614307925e-05
weather/heatindex_F 44.985
weather/humidex_F 46.31768009283141
weather/inDewpoint_F 51.23860608607752
weather/maxSolarRad_Wpm2 6.327947341202209
weather/rainRate_inch_per_hour 0.0
weather/windchill_F 46.2
weather/windrun_mile 0.0033333333333333335
weather/interval_minute 5.0
weather/hourRain_in 0.0
weather/rain24_in 0.8500000000000001
weather/dayRain_in 0.409

In the US, the Ambient Weather WS-2902C is $189 from Amazon - far less expensive than Davis.

[Musashi (Niel Gerryts)]

Thanks everyone. This is very useful.

The Davis models are a bit beyond my budget but the Ambient Weather model can work. And if I go for that one and can’t get WeeWX to work, I should be able to use the Ambient Weather binding.

Thanks!

[seattleneil (Neil Ostroff)]

@Musashi

The Davis models are a bit beyond my budget but the Ambient Weather model can work. And if I go for that one and can’t get WeeWX to work, I should be able to use the Ambient Weather binding.

In case you’re interested, here’s a screenshot of what my WeeWX web page looks like:

Be sure to install the latest firmware (using the awnet app) since early firmware versions lacked the awesome feature of being able to send weather station data to a custom IP.

A simpler option (that does not maintain a local database of weather info) is to directly convert the Ambient Weather station data to MQTT using ambientweather2mqtt GitHub - neilenns/ambientweather2mqtt: Converts Ambient Weather data to MQTT events

The github web page provides excellent instructions on how to configure the Ambient Weather station using the awnet app (the same instructions apply for either sending data to the WeeWX listener or the ambientweather2mqtt listener).

Good luck.

[Rolli (Roland Mayr)]

I just got my new Weather station, it’s a Waldbeck Halley WH2650 it’s € 109 from Amazon and it works with the FineOffsetWeatherStation Binding.

@Musashi

Seems complicated. I don’t know what the wire protocol is or how to set it up.

It is not! Just set up your Weatherstation, install the FineOffsetWeatherStation Binding, and scan for new devices, thats it.

Hop that helped.

[Musashi (Niel Gerryts)]

This is perfect, thanks!