PredictWind

[rockDAWG]

Is there anyone a paid member of PredictWind.com? I just joined as a free member, but the service/products are quite interesting. I tempted to sign on for their pay service.

They seem fair that you can suspense the membership if you don't use it. It is perfect for me. I often sailed back to back for a couple months and take a break for a few months and then restart again.

[zboss]

Yes. Here is my issue with PW.

The data that is available with the basic subscription is data is available anywhere. You don't need PW for it.

So, unless you are planning on using it for route planning then I would not bother. Even so, the "middle subscription" does not take into account ocean currents, which as you known, can significantly change your routing. So, you are left with the very expensive $500 a year option plus additional costs for custom routing.

[J Clark H356]

It's a good program, but look at Sailflow. I used both last year on a cruise and found Sailflow much better.


Sent from my iPad using Cruisers Sailing Forum

[carstenb]

I have it and use it all the time. I found it generally is very accurate (more accurate than most national weather forecast (here in the Baltic))

[vida nueva]

The features I like from Predict Wind are:
- route plans computed with your boat polars, preferences of speed or comfort, weather and currents
- departure planning for four days out
- two weather models for comparison
- 1k wind resolution

I'm interested if other services do all that?


Sent from my iPad using Cruisers Sailing Forum

[OldFrog75]

Slightly off topic but I wonder which services the Transpac or Volvo racers use

[CarstenWL]

Slightly off topic but I wonder which services the Transpac or Volvo racers use

... I know some teams on the Volvo Ocean Race are using Adrena (Adrena, logiciels de navigation pour la régate et l'étude de performance)

Also tried PredictWind here in the Baltic but was not satisfied at all (the other Carsten from Denmark was).

Used Weather4D HD Pro on my iPad (with WRF Subscription) afterwards and was very satisfied.

Regards,

Carsten

[Boardshorts]

I recently trialled the full version and it was pretty powerful for route planning etc .... but didn't have an easy way to add it to my chartplotter so I dropped back to the basic paid version as i think the granular detail is good. Since then, it seems that the forecasts more than 48 hours out haven't been any more accurate or useful than the free versions like www.seabreeze.com.au or windfinder. It would be interesting to reconcile just how good their longer range forecasts are really.

Sent from my SM-G900I using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[autumnbreeze27]

I've used their paid service, and it didn't seem worth the expense to me. Most of the time their predictions weren't any more accurate than windfinder or other free services. The weather routing was a cool feature, but sometimes it would route you through land. It was useful to see prevailing wind conditions for a cruise, but if I was going to pay money for weather routing I'd pay it to a real person and not an automated website.

[zboss]

Well, their predictions are not any better than the ones you can get from the US and European models - its not like Predictwind is sitting on the largest super computers and an army of PHDs' churning out custom data for a couple thousand users.

Its what they do WITH the data that the major models produce that counts... routing and such. If you are just looking for weather out 3 days then any good weather service or a multitude of free sites are going to show you the same data.

This goes back to what I said earlier... if you are going to use a service like this the only tier that counts is the top tier.

[chris2014]

Hi, im a pro member of Predictwind. I have tested Maxsea vs Predictwind and made a video on youtube to show the differences in quality.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPD7m3ah5dU

[chris2014]

see also locations for high rez gribs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1lrYquUwvs

[chris2014]

I made a video on youtube to show the difference between "Predictwind's" PWG& PWC gribs VS "Maxsea's" weather routing using gribs from "Gribus" and "globalmarinenet.com".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPD7m3ah5dU

[northwestsailor]

I like the fact that the Iridium Go has an unlimited data plan for a resonable $125 per month. However if PW does all the calculations on their servers how does it take to download new routing twice per day based on current position and current WX.
Is there a way to see what polars are available to avoid having to create a custom one?

[chris2014]

Hi, you can buy Iridium Go for less else where. However your question on the Polar is that they have static polars or create one by manually inputting data in, once only and it is saved. You can use OpenCPN with polar plugin to record your sailing polar as you sail for free.
You can calculate as many routings as you wish in the yr subscription. Once you have a calculated route you can download the GPX or KMZ format.