Plan instrument-specific exposure, document installation and time settings, and retain paired checks and usable weather records.
Choose the quantities you need, the station identifier, reporting interval and intended network. Record elevation, coordinates, time zone and whether timestamps describe an instant or the end of an accumulation. Read the specific instrument and network instructions before choosing mounts; a convenient combined sensor location may compromise one or more measurements.
Photograph obstructions, surfaces and nearby heat or water sources. Temperature, precipitation and wind instruments need different exposure assessments. For example, NWS cooperative temperature guidance uses about five feet above ground and separation related to obstruction height; do not replace this with a universal four-times-sensor-height rule. Record departures from the selected network guidance instead of claiming a standard exposure.
Follow the manufacturer and site requirements for mounting, leveling, power, weather protection and communications. Record actual sensor heights and the north reference of the wind vane. Arrange qualified help for elevated masts and electrical work. Verify the rain collector opening area from its dimensions or documentation; the measuring tube may have a different area.
Check the logger clock against UTC and test the export format. Distinguish wind means from gusts, station pressure from sea-level pressure, and interval rain from a running total. Preserve missing values and trace precipitation with explicit flags. Save a small real observation set and verify the time sequence before accumulating months of ambiguous records.
Where possible, compare co-located instruments with the same sampling interval and a documented reference. Review radiation exposure, ventilation, wetting, leveling and clock offsets before applying corrections. A nearby airport can provide weather context but has a different exposure and is not automatically a calibration standard.
Retain the installation photographs, manuals, firmware/settings, baseline observations and unresolved quality issues. Keep raw exports separately from corrected data, with a change log for cleaning, moves and replacement sensors. Test a portable export and plan a manufacturer-based inspection schedule so later climate comparisons can identify changes in the station.
Relate measured liquid volume to the actual horizontal collector opening, without declaring calibration from geometry.
Inspect timestamped observations, missing values and nonoverlapping precipitation intervals. · Use paired sensor checks to calculate device-minus-reference bias, MAE and RMSE on matched times. · Save a documented local observation case and export its current inputs and summary.
Convert liquid-equivalent rate units or integrate documented interval-mean rates.
Check daily record coverage before starting longer-period summaries.
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NWS cooperative guidance treats thermometer and rain-gauge exposure separately; document the chosen network requirements and real site departures.
Keep quality-controlled observations and station history together when preparing usable data.
A sea-level-reduced display is not the station-pressure input required by psychrometric or pressure-tendency calculations.
A sensor move or correction needs a dated record rather than an unexplained replacement of old values.