Welcome to the Cumulus Support forum.

Latest Cumulus MX V3 release 3.28.6 (build 3283) - 21 March 2024

Cumulus MX V4 beta test release 4.0.0 (build 4018) - 28 March 2024

Legacy Cumulus 1 release v1.9.4 (build 1099) - 28 November 2014 (a patch is available for 1.9.4 build 1099 that extends the date range of drop-down menus to 2030)

Download the Software (Cumulus MX / Cumulus 1 and other related items) from the Wiki

Sunshine hours

Discussion specific to Fine Offset and similar rebadged weather stations
Post Reply
imballinger
Posts: 38
Joined: Mon 29 Aug 2016 6:40 am
Weather Station: AE WS3803
Operating System: Windows 10

Sunshine hours

Post by imballinger »

What exactly are the sunshine hours supposed to represent? As it's 8.35 am clear blue skys and I am getting zero hours?
User avatar
steve
Cumulus Author
Posts: 26702
Joined: Mon 02 Jun 2008 6:49 pm
Weather Station: None
Operating System: None
Location: Vienne, France
Contact:

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by steve »

Cumulus has no idea whether the sun is actually shining, it uses the 'light' reading from the station to make a best guess, based on where you are, the date, and the time of day. You may need to 'tweak' the solar settings - see the help for the station settings screen. There are also a number of threads about this on the forum, here's one which may help, for example: https://cumulus.hosiene.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=14747

Note that you need to have provided Cumulus with your correct co-ordinates for this to work at all.
Steve
imballinger
Posts: 38
Joined: Mon 29 Aug 2016 6:40 am
Weather Station: AE WS3803
Operating System: Windows 10

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by imballinger »

So I need to tweak the settings so when the sun goes behind a cloud it stops recording as sunshine hours? Or is this trying to record from when the sun rises to when the sun sets?
User avatar
steve
Cumulus Author
Posts: 26702
Joined: Mon 02 Jun 2008 6:49 pm
Weather Station: None
Operating System: None
Location: Vienne, France
Contact:

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by steve »

Once a minute, it attempts to determine whether the sun is shining. If it is, it adds a minute to the total for today. You can use the yellow sun indicator on the main screen to determine whether Cumulus currently thinks the sun is shining, and compare it with reality. Note that there will be a lag, as the station only updates its light reading once a minute (I think).
Steve
imballinger
Posts: 38
Joined: Mon 29 Aug 2016 6:40 am
Weather Station: AE WS3803
Operating System: Windows 10

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by imballinger »

So it's a fine balance, I presume were not trying to record actual sunshine on the station,
User avatar
PaulMy
Posts: 3777
Joined: Sun 28 Sep 2008 11:54 pm
Weather Station: Davis VP2 Plus 24-Hour FARS
Operating System: Windows8 and Windows10
Location: Komoka, ON Canada
Contact:

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by PaulMy »

I presume were not trying to record actual sunshine on the station,
Unless you use a Blake-Larsem Sunrecorder station ;) http://www.komokaweather.com/weather/su ... ay_v1.html

Enjoy,
Paul
Davis Vantage Pro2+
C1 www.komokaweather.com/komokaweather-ca
MX www.komokaweather.com/cumulusmx/index.htm /index.html /index.php
MX www.komokaweather.com/cumulusmxwll/index.htm /index.html /index.php
MX www. komokaweather.com/cumulusmx4/index.htm

Image
AllyCat
Posts: 1124
Joined: Sat 26 Feb 2011 1:58 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset 1080/1 & 3080
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: SE London

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by AllyCat »

Hi,
imballinger wrote:.... I presume we're not trying to record actual sunshine on the station,
Well Yes, provided that the sun is able to shine directly onto the sensor (it's the small white dome inside the Solar Pod). But this may create major issues with the accuracy of the External Temperature, etc.. (due to the poor "Sun Screen" over the T/H sensor/transmitter). Moving the Pod (or the T/H transmitter) to a more favourable position, by extending the cable is possible, but not easy.

Cheers, Alan.
Snicker
Posts: 20
Joined: Tue 07 Jan 2014 2:54 pm
Weather Station: WMR100N
Operating System: Win2012R2
Location: Norway
Contact:

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by Snicker »

Is there any way I can use the UV Index to calculate sun hours? If UV index is above 0 then count that the Sun is shining?
Where there's pleasure... there's always some pain!
-Snicker-
AllyCat
Posts: 1124
Joined: Sat 26 Feb 2011 1:58 pm
Weather Station: Fine Offset 1080/1 & 3080
Operating System: Windows XP SP3
Location: SE London

Re: Sunshine hours

Post by AllyCat »

Snicker wrote: If UV index is above 0 then count that the Sun is shining?
That's very unlikely to give a useful value. In summer, the UV Index can be well above zero, even under cloudy skies (and resolved only as an integer).

Estimation of "The Sun is Shining" can be quite difficult (particularly between Summer and Winter and near sunrise/sunset) even with quite sophisticated hardware and software. This thread is currently up to 429 posts, ;)

Cheers, Alan.
Post Reply