My first weather station was a Davis Weather Monitor II and it served me well for a number of years. I then upgraded to a Davis Vantage Pro and had fairly good use out of it, but I did have to replace a few parts and get a battery issue fixed. These were good, reliable stations that did what I wanted them to do.
When the Vantage Pro started to show signs of wearing out, I was ready to upgrade to the latest and greatest station from the same maker, but was turned off by the price. Last I checked, the Vantage Pro 2 station with a console is now well north of $1,000. With added features, it is pushing $2,000. That is a lot of money for a weather station, even if I am a weather nerd.
Those prices forced me to start shopping around for other options. I knew about the company Ambient Weather, as I had helped it test software it had written back in the early1990s, which went on to help publish Davis weather station data to the internet.
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As it turned out, it also sold weather stations at a pretty good price. Instead of selling different types of weather stations, it was now selling its own brand. I found that I could get its WS-5000 station, its top-end station at the time, for about $500. Add in extra sensors, and the price was up to about $750.
Looking at its website today, prices are up a bit. The base station costs around $650, and additional sensors range from $30 to $80 (more if you want air monitoring sensors). The only disappointment I have with the company is the high cost of shipping, usually in the $75 range for me in the Winnipeg area.
I ended up buying the station and I found it was easy to set up, connect to the internet via a router and then access the company web hosting services to get digital access to my weather station. Check out my website, bezte.ca, to see what it looks like.
There is one design flaw, in my opinion: the wind and temperature sensor is built into one device.
The problem with this is that temperature readings should be taken about one metre off the ground, while wind readings should be taken around three metres off the ground. This is tough to do when the two sensors are connected.
The temperature and humidity sensors, along with the rain gauge, seem to work just fine. The rain gauge, unfortunately, does not come with a heater, nor is there an option to add one, which means no ability to collect snowfall water equivalent readings.
To be fair, I’m not sure how accurate those readings are anyway, especially in windy locations.
The wind sensor, or anemometer, is ultrasonic and there are no moving parts to wear out. My problem is that I am not sure how good a job it does at measuring winds. I find my wind speeds now are lower than what I was measuring with my Davis station, which used wind cups. That sensor was also located well above the ground compared to the near-ground location now.
On a good note, the built-in solar panels and batteries (just your basic AAs) seem to last a long time, often up to a year.
Overall, I think it’s a good weather station. The Ambient Weather network, which is where your data goes, allows you to access and share your data with others and is easy to work with. It would likely suit almost anyone’s needs.
Daniel Bezte is a teacher by profession with a BA in geography, specializing in climatology, from the University of Winnipeg. He operates a computerized weather station near Birds Hill Park, Man. Contact him at dmgbezte@gmail.com.
