weather predicting contraption

Hi Guys,

 I am after a contraption that can tell me the temperature and predict the weather (i.e. It will rain in 5 minutes time type of thing). A temp range below -10C is pref, but not essential. I really don't want to spend more than £70. I would prefer very much if it wasn't a watch as I would like to clip it onto my shoulder strap.

 many thanks

Wouldn'nt we all! We sure would all love to know for sure definite if it is gonna rain in the next half hour or so to be able to keep ourselves dry! Sadly I don't think there is any such contraption! It is just a case of watching the weather reports - estimates, indications from the professional weather predicting services - and looking for basic sky signs around one in nature too! There are good little books out there on traditional weather predicton lore.

And as for the temperature, well there's plenty of good little fairly inexpensive Casio type watches out there for that one! A friend of mine of old keeps one of those little rain prediction sticks attached to his tent when camped out, and swears by it! The change in the humidity of the atmosphere as rain approaches makes the little stick straighten or bend accodingly to detecting approaching weather of the rainy kind, I seem to recall. I think there are numerous stockists of those as they are a novelty type item. Don't know what use it would be on the trail attached to ones pack outer though! It would more than likely just fall off I should think!

Goat

There ia whole array of met recording equipment available - skywatch do a nice little number - try ebay for these. 

you can record:

Temperature max / min

Wind speed / direction / mean 

Pressure / tendency

etc etc.

The wrist-watches tend to give you pressure (+tendency) and temperature.

.

To make  prediction you need to understand the relatioship between these readings and have a good understanding of meteorology and apply it.

There is no machine that will give you a prediction or forecast - I am afraid that is down to your ability to interpret the weather patterns - or listen to the radio.

Eyes are pretty good at spotting incoming rain; fingers,ears and nose are pretty good at telling you "too cold, put more clothing on". Seriously, unless you are willing to carry a full weather radar system then anything else is really just "oh, that's interesting" rather than "hey, that's genuinely useful" IMHO.

On the "interesting/fun" front, look at cheapie anemometers (wind speed) with built-in temperature sensor, plus a cheap barometer (pressure drops, weather likely to be getting worse).

Or, how about something like this which looks quite interesting if you're into gadgets!

I have a skywatch explorer 1 (the basic one that only does windspeed) and its pretty well made. The others look pretty good but the price goes up.

I get my altitude reading from my GPS but thats no use for weather. I have toyed with the idea of an abc watch from Suunto or the like but they are pricey and like Zubald says, my eyes are pretty good. I would always check the weather before I go out aswell,

My fave weather site

The other one I use

I would have loved to have had one of these annemonemmonemmeter things to record the windspeed this weekend!

The kind of wind that knocks you over a few times, feels like 100mph but is probably closer to 50mph in reality. 

I got mine so I could have some figures to see how much of a beating my laser competition will take rather than just saying it was hard to stand still, it knocked me over etc.

Everytime I take it out though there isnt even the slightest fart of wind, reminds me of a scout leader I had. I swear it would piss down as soon as he took his jacket off and the sun would come out if his jacket was on. We used to make him hike with his jacket on even though we were all sunburnt.

An old farmer was sitting on his porch, holding a small piece of rope.

His house guest, a city man, asked, "What's the rope for?"

The farmer said, "It's my weather vane."

"How can you tell weather with that thing?" asked the city man.

"When it goes from side to side, it's windy. When it's wet, it's raining" replied  the farmer.'

Can you see the hills?

It's gonna rain!

Can't see the hiils?

 'Cos it's raining already