Testing in the EOL staging area, over a WIFI (AP24/Etherant)and 10-Base Fiber connection showed a consistent 165 Kbyte/sec transfer of a NIDAS binary data file from the "high" dsm, which had a flash-type USB disk. This was using rsync, with on-the-fly compression. Downloading 1475 Mbyte over this connection will take about 9000 seconds= 2.5 hours every night. The file copy was done while the normal real-time data was also being sent to the dsm_server via TCP.
May 9: upgraded to 100-Base-FX fiber converters. Compressed transfer of a 111.9 MByte file took 8:44, at a reported rate of 208 kByte/sec, and a total of 30.0 MByte was transferred (compressed 119.9 Mbyte to 30.). Uncompressed transfer took 6:14 at an reported rate of 291 kByte/sec. Seems that uncompressed is faster - probably because the Viper is a slow CPU.
So not using compression, and assuming 291 kByte/sec, the nightly transfer of 1475 MByte will take about 5068 secs = 1.4 hours.
Networking
Networking during SOAS used every type of media we had, but all worked well:
2x 3G modems in Cradlepoint router at the top of the tower
Copper RJ45 running down the tower to a switch in bottom DSM
Copper RJ45 running back up the tower to mid DSM?
Copper RJ45 strung along the trees to chemistry trailers along the tower access road.
A WiFi access point in one chemistry trailer.
Fiber optic cable running ~600m between bottom DSM at the tower and the Base trailer.
A WiFi access point and switches in the Base trailer.
Long-distance WiFi access point also at Base trailer.
Long-distance WiFi station adaptors at each of Pond DSM, SODAR, and LIDAR.
Logistics at AABC Site
Base trailer was parked near a carport with an existing live power drop.
Porta-Potty was placed near trailer.
Power cable was run by hand 1800' from this power drop (two seperate 220V circuits) to transformers on the road by the tower.
Tower was powered by cable from these transfomers.
Two small trailers (TRAM + CU) were parked on the road for chemistry instrumentation and also powered from the transformers.
The tower was erected just before leaf-out to facilitate running guy wires.