Development of Capacitive Rain Gauge for Marine Environment

At present, the methods and instruments for measuring the precipitation on land may not effectively work in the offshore corrosion environment which is characterized by salt and humid. The research look at investigating the reliable and precision approach of measuring rainfall and a capacitive rain gauge for the marine environment is developed. Firstly, according to the working principle and performance requirements of the capacitive rain gauge, the modular mechanical structure and capacitance voltage conversion circuit of the rain gauge are designed, and the calibration and stability experiments of the prototype are tested to evaluate the measurement error and exam the accuracy of the rain gauge measurement results changing over time. Then, environmental adaptability experiment is carried out on the capacitive rain gauge to explore its performance in the environment of temperature and humidity changes as well as salt spray. Finally, the feasibility of the rain gauge used in the marine environment is verified by the sea test of the prototype. The measurement error of the developed capacitive rain gauge is less than 1 mm, which provides a realization method for the measurement of precipitation in the marine environment.