Anyone use wireless weather stations to monitor temp/humidity in multiple tanks?

[chris_todd]

I'm in the process of setting up three terraria as growing tanks for orchids and carnivorous plants, and I've been looking for ways to monitor temp and humidity, preferably with data logging, so I can easily identify trends.

I've been looking at these:
Oregon Scientific RMS300A

The base weather station will receive data from up to three wireless sensors, each of which will do temp and humidity, and the weather station comes with a USB cable and software to log the readings to your computer. The PC (no mac support, grrr) would have to be on all the time.

There are other weather stations that support more than 3 remote sensors, but they're considerably more expensive. And given that the software on the site above can handle multiple weather stations, if you have more than three tanks, you can just add another base station.

For three tanks, it would be about $89 + shipping, which comes to about thirty bucks a tank, or not much more than many of the standalone hygromoters I've seen.

Does anyone here use a similar system, or do I get to be the guinea pig?
:-)

[beckdg]

i used something similar without the web interface for a while. pj's tank stays pretty steady though so i find i merely have to calibrate the pucks and whatnot he has in there periodically and i'm fine.

as for the web interface you'll pretty much be the guinea pig. probably on that particular model too. unless you invest that much into your vivs or will be spending that much time away i don't see a need for the extra. you could easily use that station to calibrate other models and vice-versa instead of buying several weather stations if you'd like. i don't blame you for wanting tech toys though.

anyway, batteries will probably be your arch nemesis at this point. i figure that's a fair warning at least. rechargeables are probably a bad idea too considering moisture/humidity and all.

[chris_todd]

beckdg, thanks for the feedback!

Originally Posted by beckdg

as for the web interface you'll pretty much be the guinea pig. probably on that particular model too. unless you invest that much into your vivs or will be spending that much time away i don't see a need for the extra. you could easily use that station to calibrate other models and vice-versa instead of buying several weather stations if you'd like.

My interest in the PC datalogging is so that I can see how the temps/humidity change overnight, since I intend to keep plants that would like to see a 15-20*F temp drop overnight, as well as high humidity (e.g., certain tropical orchids and highland Nepenthes), so even if I had a calibrated puck or other cheap analog sensor, I'm not going to get up at 3 am to see what it is reading. Plus, I'm not home during the day during the week, so the logging helps there as well. Of course, there are standalone digital hygrometers with min/max features, but from what I've seen, they're not that much cheaper than the remote sensors in this setup.

As for the investment, once these three tanks are full of plants, I wouldn't be surprised to find I'd spent several hundred dollars on the plants, so I'm comfortable spending $30/tank to make sure their environment is appropriate and stable.

Originally Posted by beckdg

i don't blame you for wanting tech toys though.

Yeah, I'm a sucker for tech toys - my other hobby is amateur astronomy, which is entirely gear-driven, LOL.

Originally Posted by beckdg

anyway, batteries will probably be your arch nemesis at this point. i figure that's a fair warning at least. rechargeables are probably a bad idea too considering moisture/humidity and all.

Hmmm, that had not occurred to me, thanks for the fair warning. I guess I assumed that since these are indoor/outdoor remote sensors, they would be able to handle the humidity.

[beckdg]

i understand your interest in monitoring. there's nothing wrong with that. i was suggesting that we tend to get things to a point where we don't need to monitor every minute and at that point everything is basically set. once you're at that point you could easily monitor a lot less intricately and move your other equipment to another terrarium and feel fairly confident that things are ok with just a daily glance. if things are out of whack it should usually be easy enough to notice any time of day. if you feel more comfortable expanding further with the tech toys and can afford it then i'd do the same so no worry there. it's just another option i guess.

my grandfather was an amateur astronomer. i believe there are a couple stars named after him and my grandmother actually. there names actually went up on the nasa shuttle that exploded too... just dumb luck. anyway, very interesting stuff out there for sure. i'd love to have his old equipment. unfortunately i didn't get it when he died.

i think the idea behind the outdoor modules is that they'd be under an overhang where they won't receive direct moisture or rain. i find that many of them cannot take water directly on them. many electronic components that are made to be wet often overlook the batteries unless it's made to be fully submerged. i would not be surprised if you can not find one where the battery compartment is waterproof. throw away batteries only have to take the moisture until the juice runs out. rechargeables on the other hand would have to take that many times over and the amperage it takes to recharge them is more than they can put out. this means they are more likely to fail/leak/explode while still connected to an ac power source. failing at that point is considerably more dangerous than just having a battery leak inside your module. so all in all i'd definitely use regular batteries and attempt to place it out of direct water sources like a mister or fogger. it might not be a bad idea to seal up any seams also prior to use. froggsong uses black tape on her units around the seams to keep them from failing. i think that's a great idea you might want to do also.

[Mikey8567]

Unless it says "Water Proof" it's most likely only moisture resistant not water proof. I infact have an weather station and the temp and humidity sensor states on it and in the install directions to install it under an coverd portion of a roof or such, but not where it can come in direct water contact. Quickest way to kill a battery is to get it wet.