On Aug 16, 7:18 pm, Wayne.B wrote:
On Thu, 16 Aug 2007 20:34:00 -0000, Skip Gundlach

wrote:
Our BoatUS membership has gotten
us a dime's reduction in the price of fuel at each stop

One of the cheapest fuel stops on the east coast is the Alligator
River Marina just north of the bridge. They can tell you on the phone
or radio what their channel depth is. Further north, Coinjock Marina
also has reasonable fuel prices, and the restaurant there has some of
the best prime ribs that I've ever had. Do not order the "Captains
Cut" unless you are *really* hungry. Coming into New York Harbor,
Atlantic Highlands Municipal Marina has good fuel prices by NY
standards. There is room to anchor there along the shore near the
east end of the breakwater.

Hi, Wayne,

As it happens, I'm writing this alongside Coinjock Marina where I just
finished the biggie. I passed on dessert only because there were none
which caught my interest. That followed our fueling, and tomorrow
morning I'll go off to the local NAPA to get the right sized belts in
their Gates Green equivalent; I have one which is too long which I''ll
return. Based on the results I'm getting from my realignment of the
alternator on crap belts, this may put the replacement issues to bed.
In any case, our electricals are doing very nicely; I'll post on the
audit and scenarios of AH usage and supply once I have some real-world
experience to add to it.


Alligator closed about half an hour before we went through the bridge
- we actually called them at 7, thinking they'd be open later. We're
actually planning on centering our NY stay in the AH/Sandy Hook area
as that's where my brother lives.
See you along the way...

L8R

Skip, sated, and wondering at all the people we have met (the reason
we're here) who said they couldn't possibly finish it - but agreeing
with the universal reviews of "awesome"...

On Aug 16, 4:49 pm, Skip Gundlach wrote:


HEy Skip................ Keep those stories coming. ALso, I think
youre doing the rigt thing loging inland time. The more the better.
Once ya get that so routeen, rote, and boaring youll be ready for
some NC stuff.
And remember ur LIving your dream so have fun!
Bob

Hello,

I have been reading your posts and always manage to get entertained by
them although how you find the time is a mystery to me. Anyway I saw you
make reference to some weather pictures being downloaded in the
background. Can you elaborate on this setup?.

Thanks,

Jeannette
SV Con Te Partiro, Mazatlan

Skip Gundlach wrote:
On Aug 16, 7:18 pm, Wayne.B wrote:
On Thu, 16 Aug 2007 20:34:00 -0000, Skip Gundlach

Jeannette wrote in news:EMnxi.49875$YL5.30303
@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net:

Hello,

I have been reading your posts and always manage to get entertained by
them although how you find the time is a mystery to me. Anyway I saw
you
make reference to some weather pictures being downloaded in the
background. Can you elaborate on this setup?.

Thanks,

Jeannette
SV Con Te Partiro, Mazatlan

Skip Gundlach wrote:
On Aug 16, 7:18 pm, Wayne.B wrote:
On Thu, 16 Aug 2007 20:34:00 -0000, Skip Gundlach




I think Skip and Lydia are back at sea, but I've been aboard their boat
here in Charleston so know what he has:

http://hamtronics.com/r139.htm

Flying Pig has a different kind of antenna, but this is their direct
satellite 137 Mhz Weatherfax receiver. You simply leave it running,
attached to your laptop with the weatherfax software running in
background. When the satellite transmits its current picture to the
ground, you pick it up in a wide footprint across North America. The
receiver automatically scans all the satellite channels so whatever bird
is in range of you, you'll get the pictures, which are not transmitted
continuously.

http://www.dxzone.com/cgi-bin/dir/jump2.cgi?ID=14606
Flying Pig has this antenna mounted up on its aft arch on the starboard
side of the solar array. I doubt it works any better than the turnstile
antenna from Hamtronics, which would be much easier to keep aloft than
this monster. I must admit it does make an impressive picture. I'm not
sure whether Skip's is a commercial or homebrew model.

Hope this helps. The pictures are very detailed. It's like having
access to the same pictures on the internet. Here's the picture it
produces from my favorite weather site:
http://vortex.plymouth.edu/gE_ir.gif
The Plymouth State College (NH) weather site is completely operated by
meteorology students and free for all without all the SPAM nonsense. (c;



These *******s keep calling me so I'm feeding them to the spambots.
--
Sunrise Communications
1374 E. Republic Rd.
Springfield, MO 65804
866-483-1228
417-886-7091
http://www.sunrisecommunicationsinc.com/
877-842-3210
866-842-3278
United Healthcare
http://www.unitedhealthcareonline.com/

On Sat, 18 Aug 2007 12:27:15 +0000, Larry wrote:

Jeannette wrote in news:EMnxi.49875$YL5.30303
:

Hello,

Flying Pig has a different kind of antenna, but this is their direct
satellite 137 Mhz Weatherfax receiver. You simply leave it running,
attached to your laptop with the weatherfax software running in
background. When the satellite transmits its current picture to the
ground, you pick it up in a wide footprint across North America. The
receiver automatically scans all the satellite channels so whatever bird
is in range of you, you'll get the pictures, which are not transmitted
continuously.

http://www.dxzone.com/cgi-bin/dir/jump2.cgi?ID=14606
Flying Pig has this antenna mounted up on its aft arch on the starboard
side of the solar array. I doubt it works any better than the turnstile
antenna from Hamtronics, which would be much easier to keep aloft than
this monster. I must admit it does make an impressive picture. I'm not
sure whether Skip's is a commercial or homebrew model.

Hope this helps. The pictures are very detailed. It's like having
access to the same pictures on the internet. Here's the picture it
produces from my favorite weather site:
http://vortex.plymouth.edu/gE_ir.gif
The Plymouth State College (NH) weather site is completely operated by
meteorology students and free for all without all the SPAM nonsense. (c;



These *******s keep calling me so I'm feeding them to the spambots.

Larry,
I have looked at these links and have spent the last few hours
wandering about the web. What I cannot find out is whether I can
receive these photos south of the equator. Seems like a great system
at a reasonable cost. Can you advise please.

cheers
Peter
N.Z. yacht Herodotus

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 22:02:33 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

I have looked at these links and have spent the last few hours
wandering about the web. What I cannot find out is whether I can
receive these photos south of the equator. Seems like a great system
at a reasonable cost. Can you advise please.

That's really a two part question. I'm reasonably certain that you
could receive the pictures but I don't know if the satellites are set
up to capture southern hemisphere images.

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 09:40:34 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 22:02:33 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

I have looked at these links and have spent the last few hours
wandering about the web. What I cannot find out is whether I can
receive these photos south of the equator. Seems like a great system
at a reasonable cost. Can you advise please.

That's really a two part question. I'm reasonably certain that you
could receive the pictures but I don't know if the satellites are set
up to capture southern hemisphere images.

Is it worth noting that CRTs need to be aligned properly, according to
the local version of the earths magnetic field?It is different
according to the latitude, especially which hemisphere you are in.
Flat screens don't care.

Casady

* Richard Casady wrote, On 8/20/2007 10:57 AM:
On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 09:40:34 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 22:02:33 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

I have looked at these links and have spent the last few hours
wandering about the web. What I cannot find out is whether I can
receive these photos south of the equator. Seems like a great system
at a reasonable cost. Can you advise please.
That's really a two part question. I'm reasonably certain that you
could receive the pictures but I don't know if the satellites are set
up to capture southern hemisphere images.

Is it worth noting that CRTs need to be aligned properly, according to
the local version of the earths magnetic field?It is different
according to the latitude, especially which hemisphere you are in.
Flat screens don't care.

You just turn the tube up-side-down for the Southern hemisphere.

Really.

When I worked on an orbiting telescope we discovered that the star
trackers had insufficient magnetic shielding. I had to create an
ephemeris database for the magnetic field in orbit, and apply the
corrections to the nav solution.

I doubt there are many using CRTs for computers on boats. A bigger
issue is compass corrections.

Herodotus wrote in
:

Larry,
I have looked at these links and have spent the last few hours
wandering about the web. What I cannot find out is whether I can
receive these photos south of the equator. Seems like a great system
at a reasonable cost. Can you advise please.

cheers
Peter
N.Z. yacht Herodotus


Peter, the Satellite Services Division of NOAA, our weather bureaucrats,
is on :
http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/
with full access to all weather products that come down from the birds.

The birds do an extensive tropical zone picture set every few hours that
come down on 137 Mhz. They also take a "full disk" picture of the whole
hemisphere you may find useful. However, their sector scans appear to be
limited to the northern edge of South America up to Canada...the
Caribbean and USA. If there is some particular weather of interest to
the US Military or commercial interests, they make special arrangements
to photograph it in IR/Visible/Water Vapor if it's over the bird's
horizon, including South America.

Of course, Geostationary Equatorial satellites, even so high up, cannot
see the very high latitudes in either direction. The website also
contains MITSAT pictures from the Antarctic, south of NZ to Siberia.
These satellites are over your horizon for direct contact, making it
impossible.

Full disk images from Meteosat:
http://www.goes.noaa.gov/FULLDISK/GMIR.JPG
are also from this website, which covers the whole South Atlantic in its
full disk pictures. I'm not sure what frequency Meteosat operates on for
direct download of its pictures. Search Google for Meteosat schedules
and you should be able to find them with the transmission times. South
America is on the western edge of Meteosat's view from over Africa. This
bird's pictures are fantastic as they show the spawning grounds of the
hurricanes headed for me.

A massive gallery of GOES pictures from the two 137 Mhz birds is stored,
forever I think, on:
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes/misc...ng_images.html
which will show you what kind of pictures it takes, including the
Southern region.
Here's a tropical cyclone off the Brazilian Coast:
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes/misc/040326/040326.html
Those pictures would be available on the 137 Mhz receiver from
Hamtronics. However, I do not see a "regular schedule" of South Atlantic
pictures, probably as it would require too much precious fuel to spin the
bird around all the while to take them.

Larry
--