Electronic acquisition of hydrologic data from intensively instrumented hillslopes

A new concept in recording data from a large network of transducers in the field is described. Each transducer is equipped with an addressable switching unit enabling parallel connection by a single four wire cable and sequential interrogation from a micro-computer controlled data logger. A simple water level transducer suitable for both large stilling wells and piezometers, which returns an audio frequency signal with pulse width proportional to water level, is described. The use of audio frequency signals enables telephone grade circuits to be used and avoids many of the problems associated with direct current signals, whether current or voltage, commonly used at present. A field installation of 30 piezometers, a tipping bucket raingauge, a weir-stage recorder and logger controlled water sampler is described and examples given of the data collected from a single piezometer transect during a major storm event.