The weather station consists of a wireless Davis Vantage Pro 2 installed in May 2008 and situated in a suburban back garden in Teignmouth, Devon. The photo on the right shows the station shortly after installation. Data is transmitted every few seconds (from the small white box centre right in the photo), indoors to a receiving console. The data is then sent via a modem to a PC where it is uploaded to the web every 10 minutes.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) agreed standard for the height of thermometers is 1.25 - 2m (4ft 1in - 6ft 7in) above ground level in a white louvered screen. The Teignmouth thermometers are approximately 1.9m above ground level. The temperature and humidity sensors are both sited in the louvered screen below the cone of the 5 inch diameter (standard size) tipping bucket rain gauge. The gauge tips every time 0.2mm of rain falls.

Ideally the anemometer should be installed at a height of 10m above ground level in an open area but at present the anemometer is situated approximately 2.2m above ground level. Exposure is far from perfect as buildings and trees in the near vicinity will affect the free flow of air in all but a NNW and SSE direction i.e. roughly following the line of the valley. If you examine the data you'll notice that for much of the time the wind is blowing from these directions for the majority of the time.


I have various future plans for enhancing the site instrumentation and instrument exposure:

- To add a webcam
- To add a grass minimum thermometer to monitor the frequency of ground frosts
- To add soil temperature and moisture sensor along with a leaf moisture sensor
- To resite the anemometer and wind vane to a more suitable location. Such a location would be at least 2m above rooftop level giving an effective height above ground level of approximately 10m. Even so, the land rises sharply to the west and so the flow of air from this direction is likely to be affected, hence even this location would not be ideal!

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