Clevedon Weather - Event / Change Log

Date	Event	Comments
04/04/2007	PurchasedWMR-100
06/04/2007	Found base station would not communicate with computer over the USB port.	Complete WMR-100 weather station returned to supplier for exchange.
16/04/2007	Replacement weather station collected from local CityLink depot after they messed up delivery.	Replacement weather station installed and USB comms confirmed working
06/05/2007	Purchased a second-hand Compaq EN866 SFF 256Mbyte computer off eBay to enable 24 hour a day weather logging and web site updates	The Compaq EN866 SFF while being quite old is a very quiet computer. It also only consumes about 40 watts of electricity, which makes it ideal 24 hour operation.
12/05/2007	Purchased Ambient Weather - Internet version of Virtual Weather Station software.
16/05/2007	Virtual Weather Station (VWS) software up and running.	Initial web site started and data being sent to Wunderground.
09/06/2007	Had VWS crash a number of times for no identified reason.	Fault seemed to clear.
11/06/2007	VWS crashed again while being on holiday	No data collected over 10 days period
July 2007	Many more crashes of VWS resulting in more data loss. Still unable to identify cause. Investigating ways to combat problem.
14/08/2007	Found Wind speed indication stopped working intermittently.	Changed batteries in Wind/Temperature sensor and reset base station causing rainfall totals to reset.
21/08/2007	Found Wind speed indication still working intermittently.	Wind/Temperature sensor sent back to supplier for exchange
28/08/2007	Replacement Wind/Temperature arrived and installed
01/09/2008	Still getting the odd random crash from VWS, looking at ways to combat this.	Download trial version of Watchdog - O - Matic Pro from Kwakkelflap a program that claimed it could restart crashed programs.
30/09/2008	Purchased Watchdog - O - Matic Pro from Kwakkelflap after a successful 30 day trial version proved that it could recover from the intermittent crashes of VWS
01/01/2008	WMR-100 rainfall totals reset for the start of then New Year
05/01/2008	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals
30/01/2008	Trial with Weather Cam	Initial trial using a number of different demo versions of software.
06/02/2008	Weather Cam software finalised to Image Salsa	Found that Image Salsa seemed to offer all the option required.
14/02/2008	Fitted a USB 2.0 PCI card to enable the weather cam to be run from the weather computer
16/02/2008	Upgraded the memory in the computer from 256Mbyte to 512Mbyte
02/03/2008	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals
15/03/2008	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals
03/04/2008	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals
05/05/2008	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals
10/05/2008	Registered clevedonweather.co.uk/ domain main with the intension of hosting my own web site using my weather computer.	Not un-expectantly found that the computer running Virtual Weather Station and ImageSalsa was not fast enough to run a web server as well.
14/05/2008	Purchased a second-hand HP Compaq D530 SFF 2.8GHz computer off eBay	Like the EN866 the D530 is a very quiet computer. It also only consumes about 40 watts of electricity, which makes it ideal 24 hour operation.
17/05/2008	Transferred the installations Virtual Weather Station and ImageSalsa to the new computer. Installed The Apache HTTP Server Project for Windows and clevedonweather.co.uk/ was up and running	The www.kennaway.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk web site currently remains operational but the frequency of the updates to the page has been reduced. However the weather data on clevedonweather.co.uk web site page is updated as often as once a minute and the WeatherCam every 20 seconds.
25/05/2008 23:52	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer
26/05/2008 08:00	Attempted to re-start WMR-100	Carried out reset on WMR-100, this time it did not restore USB comms, Re-booted computer, computer can see weather station but still no comms. Removed batteries and power supply, left for a few minutes, replace batteries and power and after a while started comms again (08:30). As a result this resets rainfall totals again.
28/05/2008 10:21	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer, yet again	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals.
01/06/2008 19:21	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer, yet again	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals.
23/06/2008 21:02	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer, yet again	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals.
01/08/2008 20:16	Memory failure in HP Compaq D530. One of the DDR RAM modules failed. Replaced with two Corsair 512Mbyte modules doubling the amount of memory.	Failure caused about one hour interruption in weather station and web server.
03/08/2008	Added a new page to the site which displays a .wmv movie of the last 8 hours footage from my weather cam.	Uses ImageSalsa to save sequential files every 20 seconds and then uses MovieSalsa every 15 minutes to make AVI and converts it to a wmv using windows media encoder 9.
18/08/2008	Became a member of Citizen Weather Observer Program and now upload weather data every 10 minutes to them. I needed to install a small free add-on program to VWS called VWSAPRS. My user call sign is DW1143
25/08/2008 23:20	My HP Compaq D530 died after making a made a funny bang. On removing the lid I found that the main chipset heatsink had fallen off due to one of the lags on the motherboard that anchor the heatsink failed.	The web site has been down for about 17 hours and is now running on my original Compaq EN866 SFF. It will take time to recover all the web pages.
26/08/2008 18:25	Clevedon Weather back up and running with a limited service.
06/09/2008 13:00	Purchased a HP DC 7700 SFF computer to replaced the HP Compaq D530. This new computer has a E2160 Dual Core processor with 1GByte of DDR2 RAM and 80GByte SATA HDD	Full web site service returned including weather movie. Now running Virtual Weather Station version 14.nn and Apache Server version 2.2.9
14/09/2008 16:23	WMR-100 lost USB communications with computer, first time in nearly three months.	Carried out reset on WMR-100 which restored USB comms, as a result this resets rainfall totals.
28/09/2008 02:00	The outside temperature sensor went wrong. Indicated temperature rose to 50C. I have removed the outside sensor to see if will recover as it may be due to damp.	Outside temperature sensor is working again but for how long, who knows. (28/09/2008 11:30)
01/11/2008 12:00	Changed weather station equipment to Davis Vantage Pro 2 from Skyview . Some of the web pages edited to suit. No longer measuring UV index, may consider a solar radiation detector when funds allow.	I really hope this works better than the WMR 100
11/11/2008 18:30	Added a solar radiation sensor purchased second-hand from eBay. Only a temporary installation, hopefully install it better at the weekend.
15/11/2008 12:00	Completed a more permanent installation of the solar radiation sensor. It is now mounted an a handmade bracket at the top of the mast. This hopefully limit the time the sensor is in the shade during the winter months.
24/11/2008	Added another 2GByte of DDR2 RAM to my weather computer purchased from Crucial UK . I have found in the past that it does not pay to buy cheaper generic memory.
29/12/2008	I am working through the web pages one at a time editing the "html" to try and validate them with W3C. I can't guarantee all the pages will be validated. These are likely to be the web page that VWS generate from .htx templates	Initially I was validating them to HTML 4 but I am now trying to validate them to XHTML 1.0
26/02/2009 07:00	www.clevedonweather.co.uk unavailable during the daytime due to Apache server being offline, unknown reason.	Server put back online at around 18:55
10/04/2009	Installed a trial version of VirtualVP by SoftWx to allow up to 4 programs to communicate via virtual serial ports to the Davis console.
10/04/2009	Installed a trial version of Weather Display see if I can record and display extra weather information.
18/04/2009	Purchased the full version of both Weather Display and VirtualVP after finding both program could benefit my web site
19/04/2009 >	Started adding additional web pages using data from Weather Display.
19/08/2009 > 20/08/2009	No Internet connection for about 10 hours. External fault
19/10/2009	Installed a Davis Wireless Leaf & Soil moisture/Temperature Station to my Weather Station. I currently have a Grass level temperature sensor mounted about 75mm above the ground. I have also got a soil temperature sensor inserted to a depth of 75mm.
27/06/2010 18:10	Updated Virtual Weather Station software to version 14.01p25 from 14.00p42	Installation went ok but needed to to reset 5 day forecast and a few other internet setting.
14/07/2010	Found that I was not getting the correct rainfall measurements. Check rain gauge found the small hole at the bottom of the funnel blocked with a died insect or spider.	Cleared just in time as the following day was the wettest day to date of 2010. I think this blocking of the Davis rain gauge may be quite common as Thornbury Weather recently had a blocked Davis rain gauge.
30/07/2010 17:15 to 23:10	Found web site offline, rebooted router which cleared fault!!
04/08/2010	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37p build 43	This fixed a fault with thumbnail icon not being rescaled.
22/08/2010 12:36 to 15:54	Web site offline due to no Internet connection for about 3.5 hours. External fault or iffy cable modem.	Contacted ISP and was told that it looks like my cable modem had failed. Internet service returned at 15:54 still do not know if it was a cable modem or external network fault.
08/09/2010	Adding Javascript menus to web page. This will allow me to update the menus with editing every single page in the site.	Using Ultra Menu Javascript menu by AntsSoft
12/09/2010 11:30 to 15:15	Web site offline due to no Internet connection for about 3.75 hours. Ready light on cable modem flashing.	Contacted ISP, Engineer visit booked
23/09/2010 11:15 to 24/09/2010 03:28	Web site offline for 16 hours. I was not here at the time and could not determine the reason the the loss of internet connection.
25/09/2010	Split the logs files page into four new pages as they were getting too long to manage. Also moved them all to a new directory.	New pages: Event / Change Log, Internet Usage, VWS Errors and Watchdog errors
29/09/2010	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37p build 87
02/10/2010	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37p build 88
09/10/2010	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37p build 93	Fixed bug with all time records gif
17/10/2010	Edited the all time record page and added an extra drop down menu to improved navigation
19/10/2010 21:24	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 00
24/10/2010 15:50	Web site offline for 30 minutes for routine maintenance.
10/11/2010 21:24	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 01 10th Nov
16/11/2010 17:00	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 02 16th Nov
17/11/2010 18:00 to 20:15	Web site and computer intermittently offline due to 4 power cuts
19/11/2010	Web site intermittent due to internet connection problems
12/12/2010	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 06
26/12/2010	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 10
11/01/2011	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 16
17/01/2011	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 22
20/01/2011	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 25
25/01/2011	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 28
28/01/2011	Updated VWSaprs to VWSaprs2 - Program that updates CWOP from VWS	See http://www.wxforum.net/index.php?topic=10220.0 for more details
18/02/2011 08:45	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 33	Version released on 16th Feb 2011
28/02/2011 20:49	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 34	Version released on 28th Feb 2011
03/03/2011 20:35	Re-installed full Weather Display main program version 10.37q build 34	Version released on 3rd March 2011
04/03/2011 07:45	Battery failure in the Davis ISS at about 04:00 which stopped most of the measurement parameters being recorded.	Battery replaced
05/03/2011 07:45	Installed second weather camera in the garden facing east.	The camera is a Panasonic BL C140 mounted outside. The camera is a wired IP camera and is connected to my network a pair of PowerLine units
09/03/2011 21:35	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 34	Version released on 9th March 2011
17/03/2011 18:00	The web site was offline for about 30 minutes while I was upgrading my internet connection from 20Mbps to 30Mbps	Installed new Virgin Media Super Hub which provides me 30Mbps download and 3Mbps upload. This should improve the web site performance.
20/03/2011 18:25	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 37	Version released on 20th March 2011
01/04/2011 16:25	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 39	Version released on 1st April 2011
18/04/2011 06:35	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 41	Version released on 17th April 2011
21/04/2011 13:30 to 15:15	Web site offline due loss of connectivity	Low signal level ?? -1.0dBmV Downstream, 53.9dbmV upstream
22/04/2011 14:00 to 14:40	Web site offline due loss of connectivity
23/04/2011 12:00 to 15:40	Web site offline due loss of connectivity.	Reported to Virgin Media who told me there was unplanned maintenance being carried out in my area. Was unable to tell me when my service would be restored.
25/04/2011 13:15 to 15:20	Web site offline due loss of connectivity.	Reported to Virgin Media who told me there was a fault in my area. Estimated time for repair to be completed by 21:50
10/05/2011 20:40	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 42	Version released on 5th May 2011
30/05/2011	Add a Hobby board Lightning strike counter to my weather station	Installation needs to be improved to reduce spurious counts
02/06/2011 12:15 to 15:45	Web site offline due loss of connectivity.
03/06/2011 10:14 to 16:00	Web site offline due loss of connectivity.	Reported to Virgin Media who told me there was a fault in my area and is being worked on
03/06/2011 17:00	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 44	Version released on 3rd June 2011 Added feature to allow uploads to http://wow.metoffice.gov.uk/
13/06/2011 06:40	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 46	Version released on 13th June 2011
11/07/2011 06:40	Updated Weather Display software to version 10.37q build 55
11/07/2011 11:30 to 16:00 17:30 to 21:30 22:15 to 23:15	Web site offline due loss of connectivity.	Reported to Virgin Media who told me there was a fault in my area and is being worked on
23:00 23/07/2011	Blueyonder web site closed down (www.kennaway.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk) and replaced with a new Virginmedia website www.clevedonwx.webspace.virginmedia.com
02/08/2011	The computer running my weather station software and web site started to go wrong. Programs would crash and could not be restart.	I found that if I restarted the computer and disable some of the programs the computer would run for between four and six hour before going wrong again. Tried restoring the computer to a backup from a day few day previous but no improvement. Purchased a replacement computer off eBay, a HP DC7900 with E8500 processor.
05/08/2011	Transferred Weather station over to new computer but with some data loss
22/08/2011	Replaced all the Weather Display monthly pages with one custom php page. This should now be nearly maintenance free
15/01/2012 15:30 to 17:30	Website down due to a hard drive failure	Rebuilt computer on to spare hard drive using the backup from 14th Jan 2012 from my Windows Home Server 2011. Approx 20hour of weather data lost.
15/01/2012 19:30 to 20:30	The spare hard drive turned out to be noisy so purchased new 500GB WD Caviar Green from PC World. Website down for installation of new hard drive and restoring data.	Rebuilt computer on to new WD Caviar Green 500GB hard drive using the backup from 19:22 16th Jan 2012 from my Windows Home Server 2011. Approx 1 hour weather data lost.
06/02/2012	Station 1 Low Battery warning message received	Replaced ISS battery and reset alarm on console.