# New tempest user — confused about solar radiation and luminance readings

**URL:** <https://community.tempest.earth/t/new-tempest-user-confused-about-solar-radiation-and-luminance-readings/27353>\
**Category:** Tempest Owners\
**Tags:** tempest\
**Created:** [June 11, 2025, 11:51pm UTC](https://community.tempest.earth/t/new-tempest-user-confused-about-solar-radiation-and-luminance-readings/27353 "2025-06-11T23:51:04Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![tempest24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f05b48/32.png) [@tempest24](https://community.tempest.earth/u/tempest24)\
**Post date:** [June 11, 2025, 11:51pm UTC](https://community.tempest.earth/t/new-tempest-user-confused-about-solar-radiation-and-luminance-readings/27353/1 "2025-06-11T23:51:04Z")

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Installed the tempest a couple of days ago. Everything seems to be ok, but today on the first sunny day of the week, the solar radiation peaked at 17000W/m^2 and over 2280000 lux. Apparently my Tempest seems to think I’m on Mercury or something. Because here on earth I believe the max is around 1000W/m^2.  
Do I have a bad unit, or is this part of the calibration process? (But darn — that is way far off….).

 ![IMG_6486](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/uploads/sws/original/3X/5/f/5fdf399e0a28a84e91d7432c7336b272aeb776d9.png)

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**Author:** ![user293](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/community.tempest.earth/user293/32/13484_2.png) [@user293](https://community.tempest.earth/u/user293)\
**Post date:** [June 12, 2025, 2:13am UTC](https://community.tempest.earth/t/new-tempest-user-confused-about-solar-radiation-and-luminance-readings/27353/2 "2025-06-12T02:13:00Z")

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Hi…contact customer service. I had the same problem and they were able to correct it remotely. They will also be able to determine if it is defective too. Good luck.

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**Author:** ![sunny](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/community.tempest.earth/sunny/32/16368_2.png) [@sunny](https://community.tempest.earth/u/sunny)\
**Post date:** [June 12, 2025, 9:33am UTC](https://community.tempest.earth/t/new-tempest-user-confused-about-solar-radiation-and-luminance-readings/27353/3 "2025-06-12T09:33:54Z")

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it takes some time ta calbriate the light sensor. It needs a clear day to do so (perhaps even a couple, I don’t remember)

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**Author:** ![ronv42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8baadc/32.png) [@ronv42](https://community.tempest.earth/u/ronv42)\
**Post date:** [June 13, 2025, 10:42am UTC](https://community.tempest.earth/t/new-tempest-user-confused-about-solar-radiation-and-luminance-readings/27353/4 "2025-06-13T10:42:10Z")

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I had the same issue when they replaced my original Tempest a month ago. The guy in support had to push an update that corrected the sensor.

The bad thing is I also send my data to 5 different weather sites which means they got bad data. I am still struggling because Weewx is still showing it as a record for radiation and I have cleared out all the bad data but the record will not reset.