AcuRite Wireless Digital Rain Gauge with Self-Emptying Collector with Rainfall History, Alerts, and Current Date and Time (00899), Multicolor

I purchased one of these in 2014, and it has worked well so far. I was annoyed by short battery life in the rain collector, so I attached an external dual D-cell battery holder using short wire leads, soldering the leads to the internal battery contacts (observe polarity!), and removed the internal batteries. Using alkaline D cells, the collector will run for months. I placed the D-cell holder under a small plastic tub wrapped with aluminum foil to reflect the sun and reduce heat loading on the batteries. Use shielded wire to avoid solar degradation of the wire leads. Works fine, lasts a long time! This mod also reduces the likelihood of breaking the tabs holding the upper funnel in place.

Working well so far. Easy to set up, just make sure you set up in an open area.

I can't even comment on durability or accuracy in the real world, I let this sit on my desk for over a month because I knew from other reviews that the calibration process would be difficult and I assumed it was mandatory. They should just include a cup with a hole in it, even though it sounds like a common thing to have laying around. Here's why-My first few attempts involved a generic red party cup with a thumb tack hole punched in the lowest point. It'd drip consistently for a while, then slow down and eventually stop dripping with 10% of the water left. Not enough water weight to force more water through the small hole, surface tension, who knows. Attempts to ever so slightly enlarge the hole didn't solve this, or resulted in the cup draining too quickly.This was all precarious anyway - 1) my pyrex measuring cup is hard to nail 1 cup exactly. I resorted to using a graduated cylinder to fill it with exactly 1 cup / 237ml. It was below the line on my measuring cup. Then I'd transfer to my hole cup 2) I had to balance my hole-punched cup across the top of the unit using pencils. I disliked everything about this after the third attempt, with cups stalling out or draining too fast.Finally saw a video of someone doing it a different way and I put another spin on it. I set a grease-spatter screen across my sink and put a sandwich-type plastic storage container beneath it. I set the rain gauge on the screen and set my faucet at the slowest drip possible. I decided for more accuracy that I would let it drip until the gauge read 3.36", or double what the instruction manual states (1.68"). The water drained through the gauge, through the screen, and collected in the storage container. This took almost an hour.When the screen showed 3.36" (very lucky, I wouldn't expect to nail that perfectly in any calibration setup with 1-minute updates) I WEIGHED the contents of the bin on an accurate food scale. 448 grams. I then asked an AI chat bot thing the following question:"if 1.68 inches (1 cup) = 226.796 grams, and 3.36 inches (2 cups) = 453.592 grams, how many inches is 448 grams?" and the result was 3.32", or 98.8% accurate. I'm not going to even bother twisting the dials and running the test again, that's close enough for me. On my analog rain gauge I wouldn't even be able to make a 1.2% distinction. I'm terrible at math so I guess this is right. Whatever.

I was a little skeptical at first when buying this rain gauge. My dad and I have been tracking rainfall for years with glass gauges (we farm) and I was drawn in by the "self-emptying" part, but also a little leery of how it emptied itself, whether it would freeze in the winter, and whether the design would hold up to years of abuse the way that our plain old tubes did.So, the first thing I did when I got it was take it apart. I have to say, I was really impressed by the design of this thing. Its simple and brilliant, and I think that understanding how it works really helps put you at ease with it.Setup:Two tabs on the side of the white plastic cover allow you to unsnap the white part from the gray part. Inside, you find the measuring unit, which snaps into the gray base. When you unsnap the measuring unit from the bottom of the base, you see the place for the batteries in the bottom of the measuring unit. Once you put the batteries in and snap it back into the base, it covers the batteries to keep them out of the elements. It has two screw holes in the base that will allow you to screw it down so it won't blow away, then you just snap the white part back into the base, and its ready to go. Batteries go into the indoor unit through a flap on the back, very standard. The unit connected right away when the batteries were installed in that order, and didn't lose connection even though there is about 100 yards of space between where the rain gauge is located and where the display is located, indoors.How it Works:Now onto the fun part. The white part of the gauge funnels the water down to a drip point where it drips into the inside of the gauge. The measuring unit is underneath the drip point, and it consists of a see-saw made with two spoons and a magnet on the bottom. The dripper funnels water into the highest spoon until it gets heavy. When it has enough water, it falls, swinging the magnet past the sensor, raising the other spoon to catch water, and dumping its own water out the side of the rain gauge, all in one motion. Then it repeats with the other side. The sensor just measures how many times the magnet swings past. So, there is really only one moving part - the double spoon with a magnetic bottom, on an axis. Nothing complex or easily breakable. It basically measures the rain one tiny measuring cup at a time. And, since the spoon has an open top, holds only a few drops of water, and empties out the side of the base, there is nothing to freeze and crack, so I can leave this gauge outside - no more bringing the gauges in like I have to with the glass tubes.Also, the accuracy of the rain gauge is completely adjustable. It has two set screws underneath the ends of the spoons that you adjust up and down to control how much rain it gathers in each spoon before tipping. So, you can run it next to your favorite rain gauge, and adjust the screws until the reading is dead-on accurate.The inside unit is very similar to other accu-rite weather products. It has a clear display that includes the time and date, and a few buttons. The mode button cycles between running totals. It keeps a total for the latest rain event, the last 24 hours, the last week, and two separate running totals (A and B) that you can use to track whatever you want. ( I use A for the monthly total, and B for the yearly total.) To reset a total, you hold the clear button while you're viewing it. History takes you back to previous readings. It has two alarm thresholds. You can set an alarm for rainfall if you want to be alerted when it starts to rain. You can set another alarm for a flood watch if you want to be alerted when high amounts of rain fall. The set and + butttons are just used to set up the unit.The Bottom Line:This rain gauge uses a simple, accurate, and adjustable method to measure rain. It won't freeze and crack like tube rain gauges, so you don't have to bring it in. It keeps 5 running totals so you can see how much rain you got without having to track it manually. Better yet, you don't have to go outside to empty it after each rainfall. All in all, if you're looking for a rain gauge, this one is a good one.