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Re: [TowerTalk] Wired Anemometer for Tower?

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Wired Anemometer for Tower?
From: David Gilbert <xdavid@cis-broadband.com>
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2014 00:10:52 -0700
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>

Sigh.

That initial degree of uncertainty only exists for 12. 5 milliseconds at 25 mph (80 pulses per second). How is that even the least bit relevant here?? No way a tower or its antennas respond mechanically to anything even remotely that brief. After the first few pulses, the uncertainty rapidly decreases as the number of measured intervals accumulate and the measurement accuracy becomes dependent upon the linearity of the anemometer (rated at +/-4%) plus whatever inertial effects create acceleration/deceleration delay for gusts. I would find it very difficult to believe that response times less than several hundred milliseconds would represent anything other than pure scientific curiosity, and there isn't a shred of justification for your original contention that this kind of application requires expensive equipment. It simply does not.

Besides, the positional accuracy for eight pulses per revolution is not +/- 12.5 % ... it's +/- 6.25 %.

On top of that, in real life the anemometer would have been spinning all along, happily generating pulses that were being measured and averaged, and the only way that the full +/- 6.25% inaccuracy would be of concern for ANY 12.5 millisecond window is if you erroneously thought that wind gusts could spike with an infinite ramp. They don't ... they have their own time constant and it isn't anywhere close to being in the single digit range of milliseconds.

Dave   AB7E




On 4/29/2014 9:08 PM, Al Kozakiewicz wrote:



This is the key thing that misses the entire point.  It's not the accuracy of the time 
measurement that's the issue.  It is the uncertainty of when position transitions are 
crossed.  With either electromagnetic or optical sensors, that uncertainty is 1/8th of a 
revolution with an 8 ppr transducer.  The fact that you can measure the time between 
"pulses" accurately is not disputed.  The issue is that the rotational distance 
(hence velocity) 8 pulses represents is known only to +/- 12.5%.

Again, no practical matter since no one would try to measure wind speed with 
such a small sample and expect high accuracy.  Nor can I think of a reason why 
you would need to in this application.

Al
AB2ZY
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