Sirius weather radio?

[alaskadog]

Has anyone had experience subscribing to and using the Sirius radio weather service? If so, how did you integrate it with your present chartplotter/radar display or computer program? Thanks for any input

[Chuck Baier]

Joe, I don't know for sure about integrating into your computer but you plotter/radar needs to be compatibly with the Sirius receiver that needs to be attached. The new Garman and Raymarine plotters are set up to integrate with the receivers.

[alaskadog]

Chuck, Thanks for your input to my query. Still hope to find someone with some experience using the Sirius marine weather service. BTW, I read with interest about the sale of your boat. Good luck in your quest for the trawler that best fits your needs. I still remember you and Susan from those days at Isla Mujeres when you tried to help me with my SSB problem. We are trying to get Sun Dog ready to go on our winter/spring cruise. We are looking at the Dominican Republic and the southern Bahamas for a few months.

[dkstock]

I have a Raymarine C series system and was told that it would be compatible. I think you will be OK in the Bahamas. I was concerned about reception in the leewards and windwards and they told me that it would be unreliable. By the way, we were just in the DR a few months ago and the corruption was shocking. We were boarded every day and in one place they demanded that we give them 50 USD just to anchor for one night and had to be gone by 8 AM the next morning.

Read a recent Cruising World article about the DR. I can email it to you, but would need your email address. Not sure if I am supposed to ask for that.

[alaskadog]

Thanks dkstock,
I was able to receive the regular Sirius broadcast as far south as Honduras last winter and spring but with varying degrees of success. Am not sure if the same satellite/satellites are used but believe that different ones are used because apparently a different receiver/antennae is used to integrate with Sea Talk to get the marine weather broadcast as opposed to FM radio. Before I go to the expense of buying the hardware and paying the technicians the $100 per hour labor for the install I want to know for sure that it will work for me in the Caribbean and Central America. I will probably just stick with SSB broadcasts. I usually can pick that up on at least one of the 4 different broadcast frequencies.

[speciald@ocens.]

Coverage beyond Puerto Rico in the Caribbean will be worse than "iffy" more like non-existant for both XM and Sirius.

[alaskadog]

Thanks speciald,
That settles my question. I will stick to what I have got for the old weather guessing game.