radio controlled weather station

[pquinn]

hi folks,any body got one of these or the ones they sell in maplins?are they of any use?

http://www.aldi.ie/ie/html/offers/special_buys3_24266.htm

the longer i live aboard the more weather obsessed i seem to get,just wondering if i should get one.thanks for any comments in advance..

i meant to say that they allso tell humidity inside and outside

wheter that is something a person needs to know is another matter.

Edited November 4, 2012 by pquinn

[Guest]

Although they say they 'forecast' weather I'm unsure how they do this - to me they just monitor and display current and past weather conditions.

[bizzard]

A long time ago before the advent of Radar and the like airports had a lot of trouble landing planes in thick fog.

Several methods were tried out to combat this trouble. Here are three methods all of which were successful.

40 gallon oil drums full of paraffiny rags dotted all around the runway and set alight to lifted the fog high and long enough for a plane to land. A huge loop of large bore gas pipe riddled with holes all around the runway and set alight would do the same thing.

But my favorite was a long bamboo pole hinged at the forward end to the underside of a planes fuselage with a little caster wheel at tother end, the pole being connected to the planes throttle and elevators. When the planes altimeter showed about 30ft they would lower the pole on a string, it would trail along below and when the caster wheel struck the runway the pole would kick up and automatically close the throttle and yank the stick back putting the plane into 'stall flare out mode' for landing.

[IDS]

To be a true weather nerd you need something more like 'This link'. They cost more but are frequently on offer at ~£69. With a usb computer connection, every time you turn on the PC stored data in the unit is downloaded and stored, and can be viewed as graphs. I've had a land based one for a couple of years,very good for the money. Get one onto your Santa list.

[blackrose]

I have a cheap digital thermometer onboard with an outside temperatire sensor so I can see indoors & outdoors temperatures. I can't really see the point of a more sophisticated "weather station" when I can get a reasonable 24hour/5 day forecast online or on the BBC TV red button.

[Kyloe]

Just visit the TWO weather forum for info, and do the same as BlackRose for local temp

[ditchcrawler]

I have one as I like to see the atmospheric pressure trends and out side temperature. The one I have now also has wind speed, interesting when its blowing a hooly and also a rain gauge. The inside temperature indication tells me how cold the boat has been while its been left in the winter.

 

It also has a clock working on the time signal so is surposed to be right, but I can't check it against anything better. You can't even rely on the radio and tv now they are digital.

 

Bought mine online

[alan_fincher]

To be a true weather nerd you need something more like 'This link'. They cost more but are frequently on offer at ~£69. With a usb computer connection, every time you turn on the PC stored data in the unit is downloaded and stored, and can be viewed as graphs. I've had a land based one for a couple of years,very good for the money. Get one onto your Santa list.

Agree these are pretty good.

 

You certainly don't have to pay £100 - other places than Maplin sell them too - I have seen them as little as £50.

 

We have one at home.

 

Unless we've got unlucky, the one bit that is a joke is wind direction. The weather vane bit of ours never settles in the prevailing direction of the wind, but instead constantly swings heavily from side to side. The resulting history data that bit produces is completely meaningless.

 

Otherwise seems to work OK.

[Kiwipeter]

The minimum kit that will give you sensible forecast data is something like the Davis Pro (or equivalent) http://www.weathershop.co.uk/shop/davis-vantage-pro2-weather-station?gclid=CP2ijpuVtrMCFcbLtAodMmYAlw but it needs to be static and it helps if you you build up a good data baseline. Fairly useless on a narrowboat.

 

I ran an amateur weatherstation on a remote farm in NZ (linked into a NZ wide network) A good hobby but the kit can get seriously expensive

[Bob18]

Open the curtain just enough to see out of the window without exposing too much skin.

Are the ducks walking on the water or swimming in it?

 

If they are walking on the water its too cold, stay where you are.

If they are swimming it might just be warm enough to get up and get some logs for the fire.....

[pquinn]

Open the curtain just enough to see out of the window without exposing too much skin.

Are the ducks walking on the water or swimming in it?

 

If they are walking on the water its too cold, stay where you are.

If they are swimming it might just be warm enough to get up and get some logs for the fire.....

 

ahhhh! bob,i saw that one coming a mile off but it gave the wife a laugh and she reckons it just saved 30 quid.

[bizzard]

Open the curtain just enough to see out of the window without exposing too much skin.

Are the ducks walking on the water or swimming in it?

 

If they are walking on the water its too cold, stay where you are.

If they are swimming it might just be warm enough to get up and get some logs for the fire.....

Seagulls flying backwards usually means the winds got up strong too.

[bizzard]

Beaufort wind speed scale;---

 

Cancelled it cos i wrote a load of rubbish.

Edited November 4, 2012 by bizzard

[John V]

I believe that Admiral Beaufort's original scale only went up to 10 as he believed there were no degrees of death.

 

Bizzard you unmitigated bounder you've just made me reply to nothing!!!

[bizzard]

I believe that Admiral Beaufort's original scale only went up to 10 as he believed there were no degrees of death.

10 is storm and 11 to 15+ hurricane.

[John V]

10 is storm and 11 to 15+ hurricane.

 

I said original!

 

You forget he was an Admiral when men were men and ships were things with rags on poles!

Edited November 4, 2012 by John V

[RLWP]

For forecasting fun, you need a compass, a portable barometer and one of these:

 

 

Surprisingly accurate too

 

Richard

[pquinn]

Seagulls flying backwards usually means the winds got up strong too.

 

i reckon i will get procure myself a segull,tie it to a bit of string and see what happens.

[bizzard]

i reckon i will get procure myself a segull,tie it to a bit of string and see what happens.

Its always a grave warning, and an important part of weather law as is ''Red sky at night means the shepherds huts alight''.

[Chris Pink]

i reckon i will get procure myself a segull,tie it to a bit of string and see what happens.

 

I find my stone quite accurate enough;

 

[DaveC]

If it's just a weather forecast you want try www.xcweather.co.uk I find it pretty accurate.

 

Dave

[ditchcrawler]

If it's just a weather forecast you want try www.xcweather.co.uk I find it pretty accurate.

 

Dave

I use Metcheck

[jckm2000]

I fiited one of the grey Maplins ones to our yacht 3 years ago. Tells the time, rain fall, wind speed and pressure & history over last 24 hours. Don't take much notice of the forecast as we do that ourselves based on the above and cloud watching etc.

 

It's been with us from Portugal to Greece via Tunisia, Sicily etc and still going fine.....

 

Want one for the NB now.

Edited November 5, 2012 by jckm2000

[PhilR]

hi folks,any body got one of these or the ones they sell in maplins?are they of any use?

http://www.aldi.ie/i...buys3_24266.htm

the longer i live aboard the more weather obsessed i seem to get,just wondering if i should get one.thanks for any comments in advance..

i meant to say that they allso tell humidity inside and outside

wheter that is something a person needs to know is another matter.

 

They are on sale in UK stores at £19.99 and good value at that price. I bought an Ascot weather station from Aldi about 4 years ago at a similar price. That included a few extra features e.g. sunrise/sunset and moonrise/moonset.

I have been very pleased with it. The temperature, humidity and barometric readings have been surprisingly accurate. The forecast for rain/snow etc is probably comparable or better than the accuracy of the BBC forecast!! .. enough said.

 

You will probably find it very useful to give an accurate recording of min/max temperatures and humidity. You can make your own forecast from there ..................

[ditchcrawler]

Maplin have them on special offer at the moment http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/professional-wireless-weather-centre-n25fr?utm_medium=gcs_search&gclid=CNyhyJav87sCFc3KtAodHwoA1w&utm_content=Professional%20Weather%20Station&c=maplin&utm_source=gcs&utm_campaign=N25FR&_$ja=cgid:10148292283|tsid:49900|cid:161066083|lid:53720200243|nw:{network}|crid:32938225603|rnd:{random}|dvc:{device}|adp:{adposition}&