I promised that big post and I’ll finally do it this weekend. My setup is working flawlessly now but I did have a bizarre issue crop up. With my router sometimes the Observer-IP box would start serving up corrupt html webpages of its data. Long story short the observer-ip directly sends its data to weather underground (flawless) and shows you a direct HTML webpage (like a router configuration page) but it was this html page that sometimes would get messed up every few days. The meteobridge reads that html page and sometimes the corruption would cause it to send wildly wrong numbers to CWOP would obviously killed me in regards to accuracy for Rachio. I tried everything working with the meteobridge developer for weeks but I am seemingly the only person with this issue which I think relates somehow to my apple router. I finally gave up and paid $130 to get a “meteostick” which plugs directly into the meteobridge and gathers the data from the weather station directly over the air. No middle man. It works perfectly now but obviously added to the cost but I’m super happy now. The accuracy of my station on CWOP is now dead on and the Rachio is using the data perfectly. I’ll make a post about everything and with pics this weekend.
@boldblue737 Great to hear! Just placed the order for above, weather station coming sometime next week. I’ll post pictures as I install and chronicle the experience. Excited to contribute to the personal weather station networks. We’ve had so many issues with Apple routers, glad I don’t own one of those 
I installed this exact setup at my house just last week! I used the Ambient 1400 and the TP Link for the meteobridge. The only thing I was trying to figure out is that when I look at the weather data from my PWS on PWSweather I am not seeing the solar and UV data. Have any of you found this data on PWS? I see it on weather underground.
Here is a picture of mine on the old TV antenna.
PWSWeather is recording solar data behind the scenes but does not yet display it on their site. Further Rachio does not get solar data from PWSWeather at this time because they don’t display it. PWSweather claim to be working on it.
The only way I know of to get solar data to Rachio at this time is via CWOP. It takes a bit of effort to sign up for CWOP (not much but there is back and forth with the administrators of CWOP for 3-7 days until you are good to go) but then the meteobridge will send data to CWOP and Rachio can be set to use the CWOP station.
I have just started looking into the CWOP. So far it looks pretty confusing. I will give it a go and see if I can get set up on there. This is too much fun playing with this IRO and PWS combination. Who knew watering your yard could be so much fun?!?!?!
I got my PWS transmitting to CWOP. If I understand correctly, I will get an email from them or something before the station becomes “registered”. I did send them the email stating that I had verified my location. How long did it take for you guys to get your email/registration notice? I saw the 3-7 days but I would have thought that I would have gotten an email by now. It has been over 48 hours since I sent the email.
I think they do it like once a week in a batch. You will get an email back (I believe I got mine on a Monday) and it listed me and all the others who applied since the last batch email as being accepted. The email they send you will then say when your site will appear live and that was like another 48 hours but then it will just suddenly appear in Rachio.
Would prefer not to mount on my roof or drill into brick to mount on side of house. Would it be OK to mount to a 6 ft+ privacy fence in back yard not obstructed by any trees or shrubs in full sun?
Certainly. Key issues you will have will be getting a mount that lets you level the PWS and has it clear the top of the fence by at least 12 inches so you don’t get water bouncing off the top off the fence and into the tipping bucket which will skew your measurements high. I chose to mount mine to a pole up against my privacy fence to 1) make it easier to level and 2) reduce sway since my fence does move in high winds. Might have been overkill and mounting it on an arm to my fence might have created very similar results.
Appreciate the feedback. Planned to mount to the fence with this mounting bracket:
And this 12" mast extension to add height (unless it’s not necessary?)
I personally don’t think the extension is worth it and will increase sway. If you want super accurate wind it needs to go on the roof and with a big extension too, the standard is 33 ft above ground level. The problem with that is then rainfall totals will be inaccurate as they should be measured 6 ft above the ground. That’s why the Davis Vantage Pro 2 can separate the sensors. You have to sacrifice something and for me it was wind data but mine still is very very close and I am perhaps a foot above the fence with the way I mounted it. Too much sway and you risk the tipping bucket measuring rainfall when it shakes.
Got set up on CWOP. Wasn’t bad at all. Now to see if and how it effects my IRO.
How do you do this? If the TP-LINK TL-MR3020 unit is set to get an IP address via DHCP… do you also need to set the Observer IP to DHCP and connect it directly to the TL-MR3020 via ethernet cable?
Just had my 30th birthday and first fathers day coming up - so I have some gift money burning a hole in my pocket. I think this might be just the thing to spend it on! I love projects like this. Thanks @boldblue737 for all the detailed info and links to what you’ve purchased. A couple questions for you. First, when i follow the meteobridge.com link you posted, it seems the meteobridge is a piece of hardware between the PWS and the router. You say it’s just a software flash on the router though?
Then you later said the software flash didn’t work, so you bought the device pointed to in the above photo and it now plugs from your PWS to your router? Is that right?
Second, how often does your setup refresh data to CWOP?
@franz - did you ever get your setup completed? How did it go?
Here is the deal… The WS-1400 comes with something called the observer-ip which is a small box that physically plugs into your router and updates ONLY weather underground. The meteobridge is a router which when flashed with meteobridge software BECOMES a dedicated device that can update dozens of different online weather services. The meteobridge must be plugged into your router to update its software to BECOME the meteobridge but afterwards can be unplugged and do its magic over the wifi network. The meteobridge can READ the data from the observer-ip box and then send that data to services like CWOP. I had intermittent issues with the meteobridge reading the observer-ip box that seemingly no one else had so I decided to buy a meteostick, a small usb stick that connects to the meteobridge box and gets data directly from the WS-1400 itself which removes the need to even have the observer-ip box which I no longer use.
I update CWOP every 5 minutes and weather underground every 5 SECONDS.
Thanks for the info. Confirming I’ve already flashed the TL-MR3020 as a meteobridge (and purchased a license). It’s configured to update both Weather Underground and PWSweather.com right now. Have also set the meteobridge to connect via wifi to my WLAN and configured the meteobridge to interface with an Observer IP WS-1400 in the meteobridge web UI settings. Briefly connected the Observer IP device via ethernet to my LAN to flash it with the latest Ambient Weather firmware. Do I then simply connect the Observer IP device directly to the meteobridge via its ethernet port and the Observer IP will know how to communicate back to the meteobridge without any additional config on the Observer IP device?
I’ve not yet “installed” and mounted my Ambient Weather WS-1400 yet – that will happen this weekend. Plan to mount using the Ambient Weather recommended bracket kit on a wooden perimeter privacy fence. Am curious how far from the Observer IP people have their WS-1400 stations? How is the range?
I have my observer connected to my router. I have my meteobridge connected to my router in another port. I let the observer send data to weather underground. I let the meteobridge send data to PWS and CWOP. The two units are connected to the router on two separate ports. They “see” each other over the network. I would connect the observer first and get it communicating with weather underground. Then when you plug the meteobridge in, it will quickly find the observer on the network.
And just to triple check I am understanding correctly. Whenever you all say meteobridge you really mean the TP-LINK TL-MR3020 Router which has been flashed and therefore “transformed” into a meteobridge. Right? So when you are saying that its plugged into your other router - you basically have a router (now meteobridge) plugged into another router (internet providing router)
Exactly. Only thing I want to point out is once setup you don’t have to physically plug the meteobridge into your home router as it can work over wifi. The meteobridge is a repurposed router, the TP-link.
Does the PWS have to be plugged into the meteobridge?