PWS Temps not matching dashboard

[YellowThumb]

My Rachio 3 is set to pull weather data from my own PWS in my yard, which is uploading to WU. I have noticed that in my Racho Schedule, moisture logs, and forecasts the temps are always off by a few degrees compared to the weather history and forecasts on WU from my PWS. The Rachio always shows about 3 degrees cooler than the actual temperature and a few degrees cooler on the forecasts. This seems to be counter intuitive for a products that depends on accurate weather stats. Please advise.

[franz]

We pull forecasted data from another service that uses your lat/long coordinates. It provides hourly forecasted data we use for weather intelligence skips. We use the PWS for observed precipitation.

[YellowThumb]

So you don’t use the designated PWS for temp data at all? Only observed precipitation?

[franz]

Correct. PWS only provide real time temps whicj does not help with our need to forecast.

[YellowThumb]

What about Flex-Daily adjustments? I would think that actual temps would affect the Flex-Daily updates. For example, if the forecast was for a high of 86 degrees but the actual high temp for the day at the PWS was 90 degrees, would the actual temps be taken into consideration when flex daily updates the future watering schedule at midnight?

[franz]

This will help explain why we can’t use PWS data for flex daily schedules.

Weather Underground station not showing up for Gen 3 controller

We use precipitation data from your PWS. At one point we tried using PWS to derive evapotranspiration (ET) but there are multiple reasons why that was a bad idea. I have a rant somewhere around here… We now use the closest national data. It’s worked very well to this point. I’d be sure to pick your PWS so we actively use that for precipitation at your house. Our forecasted data comes from a blend of NOAA, radar, satellite, etc. Hope this helps.

[YellowThumb]

I understand what you saying, but I must be experiencing some type of error. My current temp at my PWS is 98 degrees. The calendar on my Rachio forecasts a high of 84 degrees. That is a VERY big difference. I double checked the location setting on the Rachio app and it is correct.

[franz]

I had the engineering team review and it looks like today forecast is 90 degrees. If you see another wide discrepancy please let us know (a screenshot helps) and I can have the team investigate further.

[YellowThumb]

Thanks for the update. I also noticed also that it updated later in the day to 90 degrees, even though the actual high temps today were over 100. The forecast to tomorrow seems to be more accurate at 100. It just seems strange that it would be more than 10 degrees off for any one day.

[YellowThumb]

Disregard. It seems like the weather updated after midnight to 100, which more accurately reflects the previous days temps. I assume Daily Flex takes the previous days updated weather into account when it updates at midnight. I’m just trying to understand how all this works. Thanks.