What's the story with the guages?

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dave g
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What's the story with the guages?

Post by dave g » Sun Aug 21, 2011 3:11 pm

What's the story with the guages?
They all seem to be offline at the moment .Know its low water season but maybe thats the time to sort them while we're not on the water.
Dont have electronic skills myself but would be happy to provide labour or cash for parts if needed.

roshaw_87
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by roshaw_87 » Sun Aug 21, 2011 11:50 pm

dido
087 9862517/ [email protected]
Intelligence is what you use when you dont know what to do

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Seanie
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by Seanie » Mon Aug 22, 2011 6:19 pm

It's great that there is still interest. I'm sorry if I dropped the ball as a project coordinator of sorts. I'm away making sure I'm not doomed to driving a rusting, smelly 1999 VW Polo with roofracks for the rest of my days.

Here's what I know about the gauges, I hope the key people don't might me giving my 2 cents. Generally, what I have found is that the people who have the required skill-set to build gauges are usually a wee bit older, have a lot of experience with electronics etc. and as a result they are in high demand, both professionally and home life, so their time is in short supply.

At first if there was an issue with a gauge I'd send a quick email or text to the gauge builder (usually either Mike S or Daithi) and they would diligently fix what needed fixing. As time went on the gauges needed fixing at regular intervals. Batteries died, phones out of credit and sensors that had broken. All of this took some time, effort and money. I didn't keep emailing the guys, I knew they were under pressure and would get to it when they had time.

All the time the guys were improving on the design, the circuit boards went through a few iterations and new gauge builders joined the project. However key reliability issues with the design kept cropping up, namely sensor failures. More people joined the project and there were more gauges placed on rivers around the country. Mike S and Daithi did a good job of giving out information and advice to the new builders. There were also some efforts to create a factory model to develop the gauges and a testing system that would insure quality. However, again these efforts didn't fully come to fruition due to the time required needed and other commitment.

There has also been a spate of vandalism of gauges, multiple times. I saw this as being a huge blow to the project. In one case the gauge was vandalised two times in a row.

Frustrated with the project there were a few efforts to pool cash so as to finance a wider effort either amongst clubs or dedicated groups, while the efforts met with a positive response, there was no one to give the cash to. Anyone with the skills was time poor, and in most cases money wasn't an issue. Everyone who has spent time on this project, even 5 minutes, has added positively to it. Most contributors have spent vast amounts of time and hundreds of euros.

Part of the problem is that these advances might be forgotten or disseminated, as people get pulled away from the project. Knowing the weaknesses of such an endeavor is key, we should proceed allowing for these weaknesses. People will come and go from the project. We need to build in continuity and memory. I've set up this Wiki as means for gauge developers and supporters to keep their efforts in step and spread the information: http://wiki.iww.ie/index.php/River_Gauges

The information is probably old and out of date, I'll try to add more to the wiki over the coming months, but as I'm getting older, I'm also becoming time poor. Please make your own edits and additions. As for the gauge page on this site, access to its data etc. are another story. I'll outline my (realistic) plans for that in another post at another time.

Simon92
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by Simon92 » Fri Aug 26, 2011 11:09 pm

Saw this thread, and sorry for going off on a tangent but it seems relevant. Saw this a while back, can't remember where but it might very well turn out to be useful. It's a website set up by the various fisheries boards with all their digitised gauges
http://hydronet.epa.ie/maps_W_0.htm?entryparakey=W

dave g
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Location:west cork
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by dave g » Sun Aug 28, 2011 4:50 pm

Had a quick look at the EPA link- seems to be great!
Gives the gauge on the flesk anyway, if we can work out its level in relation to ours it could be useful.
Also has coomhola and mealagh, not upper bandon, pity

paupier
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by paupier » Wed Aug 31, 2011 10:10 am

Quite an interesting list of active and inactive stations around the country contained in the excel file here
http://www.epa.ie/downloads/pubs/water/ ... 45,en.html

Seems like the digital gauges use this badboy http://www.ott-hydrometry.de/web/ott_de ... sog_e.html I wonder would some of the councils/OPW have a few of these not being used ;)

MikeS
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by MikeS » Mon Oct 03, 2011 10:51 pm

Hey Guys,
The Glens gauge is back in action, (power issues) just haven't been down that way to look at it in a few months, Thanks to Tony for looking after the batterys on it!! Its running low on credit...wink wink.....0864072314 O2

Tuam gauge is also back online has always been working just out of credit the last few months, thanks to who ever topped it up, much appreciated!!

Enjoy

Mike

davepierse
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by davepierse » Sun Nov 20, 2011 9:36 pm

Hey mike,

I think the glens gauge is slightly off at the moment.

Just based on Saturday its saying that it was around .8 around 11 if i'm correct but it peaked at around .7 that day and had dropped off to .5 at around 2pm. That makes it a big fat liar.

Figured you might want to know.

Thanks again for all the work you and other gauge people do. i'll try to slip a few euro into the phone.

canned
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Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by canned » Mon Nov 21, 2011 3:18 pm

Yeah I think the gauge on the glens is reading a bit low but it's more that the accuracy is a little off at higher levels.
At the runnable level of .4m it's much closer to accurate.

MikeS
Posts:34
Joined:Sun Aug 05, 2007 1:34 am

Re: What's the story with the guages?

Post by MikeS » Tue Nov 22, 2011 12:06 am

Dave,
Thanks for the update....but just like a picture the gauges never lie...you just don;t know how to read them :roll:

Just messing, yeah the time was never chnaged on the guage so the graphs were an hour off, chnaged that now!!

When the Glens reaches about .8 it starts to surge around the bridge causing some fluctuations in the level that makes it hard to read, but not major issue as you know its high anyway and in hindsight the sensor should have been on river right where the water is nice and calm but thats a whole other days work that i've no intention of doing.

As Tony says at normal levels it should be fairly close to the stick gauge, at least it used to be.

Thanks to those who are putitng credit in it.

laters

Mike

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