The Norwegian Geotechnical Institute, NGI, has recently developed and tested a new automatic precipitation gauge for rain and snow which can measure accumulated precipitation with a resolution better than 0.1 mm. The gauge, which is a direct weighing device, is based on the use of vibrating-wire strain gauges. NGI's prototype instrument has a capacity of up to 300 mm precipitation before the gauge must be emptied. A new improved version designed by Geonor has a capacity of 600 mm precipitation. A diagram showing the relationship between the automatic observations and the manual measurements is included.
In the NGI prototype the precipitation container is suspended from three small steel wires, each of which is in effect the sensing element in a vibrating-wire type strain gauge. When these gauge wires are set into vibration by an electromagnetic exciter, their resonant frequency of vibration is proportional to the square of the tension in the wire. Thus change in the frequency signals is a measure of the change in tension in the wires and correspondingly a measure of the accumulative weight of precipiation in the container.
The distance between the precipitaion gauge and the monitoring station can be up to one kilometre without any loss in performance.
