Campbell Scientific has available both portable and stationary automatic water samplers that can be used for stormwater, wastewater or other water-quality applications.
The samplers use external vacuum pumps to draw water through intake tubing, instead of the traditional peristaltic pumps that induce flow by squeezing flexible tubing. Advantages of the vacuum pump method include faster sampling rates, better vertical lifts, longer sampling distances and less maintenance. Because the vacuum method disturbs the water samples less, they better represent the original water solution, especially if the solution has high concentrations of suspended solids.
The automatic water samplers include a controller that can accept a pulse input (eg, rain gauge), a 4 to 20 mA signal (eg, flow meter) or initiate a sample on a timed basis. The samplers can also be interfaced with the company’s data loggers. The data loggers can measure nearly any turbidity, water level or hydro-meteorological sensor, as well as control the sampler based on time, event or measured conditions.