How to interprete the quality code diagrams

For each station and year a diagram containing time series of quality codes is presented. The performed quality checks follow the Initiates file downloadBSRN Global Network recommended QC tests, V2.0 from C. N. Long and E. G. Dutton. The quality codes are described in: http://wiki.pangaea.de/wiki/BSRN_Toolbox#Quality_codes. The codes were produced using the BSRN-Toolbox (physically possible option) and vizualized via PanPlot. The diagrams may be used to obtain a brief overview of the data quality. The diagams just display the result from testing the phyical possible limits. Measurements which exceed the physical possible limits should be considered as highly suspect. Nevertheless, not all measurements outside these limits denote real errors. For example night time zeros below -4 W/m² may occur in polar regions and during strong temperature changes; or short-wave radiation exceeds the upper possible limit because of multi-reflection. For any data available the user is strongly recommended to perform additional and individual quality checks before using the data!