On Fri, 05 Jul 2019 19:11:52 -0700, Jeff Liebermann
wrote:

On Fri, 5 Jul 2019 15:54:24 -0700, OGX wrote:

not on for a wild goose chases.

You don't know what you're missing [1].

I guess no one here knows much about solar panels or charging 3 AA cells
and what is needed.

True. Nobody here knows anything that will help you deduce what has
failed without you taking down the wx station, cleaning out the
inevitable corrosion, inspecting the batteries, and making a few
measurements. However, you're in luck here. I've had some experience
with both the WS-1200 and WS-1201-IP.

Spare parts. Sorry, no solar cells:
https://www.ambientweather.com/amwewswestre1.html
The WS-1200 uses rechargeable alkaline batteries.
https://www.ambientweather.com/amws1000batt.html
Rechargeable alkaline batteries are only a little better than junk.
They cannot be recharged to 100% of original capacity and are only
good for a limited number of partial recharges. It doesn't take much
to kill them:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechargeable_alkaline_battery
The capacity of a recharged alkaline battery declines
with number of recharges, until it becomes unusable
after typically about ten cycles.
So, every time you run the weather station batteries down to zero
(such as after a cloudy winter), you kill one of the 9 lives of this
cat. Ambient is apparently aware of the problem as the newer
WS-1201-IP uses a super capacitor instead of batteries. I suspect you
could replace the 3 AA cells with a super capacitor:
https://www.ambientweather.com/amws1200ip.html#caption
Note: The WS-1201-IP replaces the WS-1200-IP. The WS-1200-IP
uses rechargeable batteries that are charged by a solar collector.
The WS-1201-IP uses a super capacitor for energy storage, and
is charged by the solar collector in the day, and
non-rechargeable batteries at night.
I think you'll find that the batteries are dead, your solar cells are
just fine, and you'll either be making a phone call to Ambient to see
if they offer an upgrade to the WS-1201-IP, or buying 3 more
rechargeable alkaline cells.

My weather station uses rechargeable alkaline AAs.
When they failed after several years of use the outdoor unit
continued to function in daylight but not in the dark.
At first I replaced them with Nicads but that didn't work.
I found one place on ebay selling the proper ones and
they are working.
Oddly enough after an extended power outage the
weather station started displaying the symptoms of
failed batteries. A reset of the display unit fixed that.