Crestline Soaring Society

Simba is hooked up to the weather station and the internet, so the weather graph and table are working again!

Bill Cody, the tower owner, made a special trip out to Crestline (2 hour drive for him) today so I could get in the building and put the computer back into the system. A couple of days ago I found that the internet settings had inadvertently gotten screwed up while the box was in for service, which was why it wouldn't connect with the LAN. Discovering and fixing this problem required connecting to Simba via a serial terminal, which I'd not had to do previously.

The CSS MarshallCam is back online! I got the DSL settings at the new tower location sorted out and the camera started posting automatically, as it's supposed to. I can't get a response from the Simba weather computer from outside the locked building so there's no weather data as yet. Perhaps that problem is something as simple as a bad ethernet cable.

4/11/10: UpdateIt turns out the little computer, Simba, that connects to the weather station isn't connecting to the LAN. This is what they 'repaired' in December, at no charge. I'd gladly pay actual money to have an actual repair! I hadn't tried it before now because the weather station equipment was down.

Spent the day installing the CSS weather station, webcam, and windtalker at the antenna towers next to Crestline launch. Best location for them yet - no obstructions or terrain issues of any kind in any direction. The windtalker no longer requires 'interpretation' - what she says is what it is. (909)-338-3362 for the wind report.

The DSL line wasn't connecting to the internet, but the weather station and webcam are ready to go when the phone company sorts that out. Dan's aimable PTZ camera is up there and will also be available soon. The static webcam now looks southeast, to see Marshall Peak, so we won't see what's coming from L.A. with it (like the smog front) but Dan's cam will handle that, plus views of Crestline launch and more.

Webcams and wind sensors installed on the towers next to Crestline launch, 4/3/2010.

Rain gauge and humidity/temperature sensors installed on the towers next to Crestline launch, 4/3/2010.

I have not deleted any posts or comments from the forum in quite some time. A forum user thinks some content has been removed. The site logs for the last couple of days don't show any deletions, but there's been so much activity that they only go back a couple of days at this point. {UPDATE: I've just increased the log retention}

[b]Normal procedure is for those with deletion rights (i.e. the CSS Board) to discuss it with other board members before deleting anything. We've only deleted a couple of items in the last four years.

So, the Simba weather station went off line a couple of Sundays ago and a simple reboot didn't get it back online. On inspection I found that the weather equipment was fine and that the mini computer between it and the internet wasn't connecting to the LAN via ethernet. The only way to communicate with the device is via the LAN, so I had to send it in for service. This is the machine we repaired this summer by replacing the motherboard, keeping the RAM and the Flash memory with the OS and programs already on them, to the tune of $300. I expect the manufacturer to cover the failure under warranty.

I got a new rotor and cups assembly for the weather station anemometer and installed them today. Last night I epoxied the cups into the snap-in brackets on the rotor. The cup I super-glued back on to the old rotor a couple of weeks ago held but one of the others came out in the last high wind event. I had put drops of super-glue on the other cup brackets, but not in the junctions.

I just went to the site http://www.hanggliding.org via my usual link and got a page from GoDaddy.com (domain registration and hosting service) saying that hanggliding.org is being parked for free. Does anyone know what the problem might be?

7/21/09 UPDATE:

The manufacturer replaced the motherboard and re-used the Operating System chip (no longer available) and the Flash memory from the old unit, so all settings were preserved. It was literally plug-and-play! The webcam time lapse images are also functional once again - they stopped working because the scripts that manage them depend on the weather data.

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Our webhost had some problems with the hardware at the data center such that they've migrated our account to a new machine. There have been problems with the weather station and webcam updating over the last few days, but as of the latest reboot the weather station is updating, so maybe the problem was at the remote end and not with the local hardware. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

I might even be able to grab the actual data for the last few days from Simba, so we don't see those straight lines between update times.

natalia bonilla has started a website for women who fly! (just in case you don't already know) it's cool and she's put a ton of work into it! check it out!

http://www.flygirlsinternational.com/profiles/friend/listFeatured

The proximate cause of the webserver overload seems to have been some kind of fruitless but resource hogging spam bot attack, which I think we've dealt with. A couple of other minor issues, which have been dealt with by the webhost, may have been contributing factors.

I know everyone's post-fly-in enthusiasm may have waned a bit by now, but it would be great to have reports and pictures of that great event.

Comparing the replacement anemometer/wind vane ($139) with the old one, it is obvious that ice got up inside the old unit (when the mast bent over) and damaged the bearings or whatever. The old vane and cups wiggle around like a hula dancer.

Sorry it took so long to replace.