med weather information

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pcatterall

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As we will soon venture out into the Med I thought it would be a good time to understand how we will get our weather information.
Assuming that we have no SSB and are out of phone signal range then are we stuck with barometer and seaweed or would navtex or a similar system help?
We do hope to call into various marinas and they, hopefully, will have a 'Meteo' print out but we would rather not depend on that.
I have done an unsuccessful search and will appreciate a few pointers.
 
VHF often has weather / meteo channels .
We use Monaco radio for example- ( sorry the fwq is on a laminated sheet on the boat ) 25 from memory for SoF and Corsica
You need to research -area and channel .
Some have specific broadcast times ,other play a loop all day updated twice etc .
 
pcatterall said:
As we will soon venture out into the Med I thought it would be a good time to understand how we will get our weather information.
Assuming that we have no SSB and are out of phone signal range then are we stuck with barometer and seaweed or would navtex or a similar system help?
We do hope to call into various marinas and they, hopefully, will have a 'Meteo' print out but we would rather not depend on that.
I have done an unsuccessful search and will appreciate a few pointers.
Click to expand...

Navtex?
 
We found French and Italian Navtex to be pretty accurate and comprehensive. Spanish always seemed difficult to receive but the areas we sailed were covered by the French broadcasts anyway. Greek forecasts are comprehensive but the difficulties of forecasting for so may islands mean that they cannot possibly be perfectly accurate. They do give accurate warning of big changes.

French VHF broadcasts are in French although we understand that they will give a translation if required. Italian and Greek VHF broadcasts are in their laguage and English. Spanish local broadacsts may be in English but again they were a bit hit and miss.
 
Navtex gives good broad brush forecasts for most Med areas. For some weird reason, there's a large lump of the northern Spanish mainland coast where it's difficult to get good reception but the coastguard broadcasts in English on VHF IIRC. If you have a mobile signal, then we've found that Grib files (from say zygrib) are the best forecasts available. Given that most longer crossings are no more than about three days max, the accuracy of the Grib predictions is good enough for passage making.
 
Many thanks guys. I am certainly considering Navtex, are there any recommendations as to which model is best?. I've been trying to understand the 'BLOC MARINE' weather information pages and guess that I can translate well enough to get the transmissions but wonder if I will be able to understand them!!
We are bad enough at getting ( and writing down or remembering them) when in English so how we would get on understanding them in French is debatable!! It would be nice to get info on the format of the broadcasts and then understand the terms which I assume will be consistently used.
At least you have the opportunity to study what is written on the Navtex.
Thanks again for the help........meanwhile back to my study of BLOC !! ( and a Google about these Grib files)
 
Outside of mobile internet, for voice bulletins you basically have:

VHF: Spain France Monaco etc use it for Coastal bulletins, the Italian (continuous on ch68) or Croatian are Offshore bulletins

MF (mostly 1.5-2.8MHz) : lots of stations (Spain France Italy Croatia Greece Turkey etc etc), all with Offshore bulletins

HF: main one Monaco radio, several frequencies 4363 8728 etc, one offshore bulletin for western mediterranean, one for the eastern med. They are both from Meteo France, so in the Western med you may receive either one; in the eastern Med it may give you a second view after Greek or Turkish bulletins which are issued by different forecasting agencies.

I suppose you already have one VHF radio, for MF and HF you can use a general coverage receiver (basic ones from £50)

Add a PC to the receiver and you can then widen to fax charts, german rtty, etc if you wish so.

Navtex: lot of stations, Offshore bulletins. The vocabulary/abbreviations for Navtex transmission are standard, it is easy to understand both Spanish French etc stations in local language. The advantage of local language bulletins is they are usually available a few hours earlier than the English ones (due to translation), as most Navtex just send forecasts to t+24,if you have to wait until the afternoon to get an half-elapsed bulletin...
I personally have a Furuno, comparing with other nearby boats it seems it has very good receiving capabilities.
 
Try http://weather.mailasail.com/Franks-Weather/Marine-Weather-Forecasts-Mediterranean-Adriatic.

We found NAVTEX useful. The Italian service on the whole was pretty poor. Where they overlap, use the French.

French weather terms at http://weather.mailasail.com/Franks-Weather/French-Marine-Weather-Terms

We were rarely out of Internet contact. If you are moving around and don’t want a multiplicity of 3G dongles, then try GPRS and use email to get forecasts. The Saildocs text retrieval from web pages works well. BUT block big email eg >30 kb. Block all automatic updates of operating and virus software. See http://weather.mailasail.com/Franks-Weather/Weather-Communications-For-Leisure-Sailors. I am not a comms expert but learnt the hard way.

A Sony HF/SSB receiver is pretty cheap around £100. SEATTY software is cheap. At least you can get the DWD forecssts for up to 5 days ahead although GRIB files are rather better. You can also hear Radio Monaco on HF/SSB for the western Med. There is a Greek HF/SSB service for the Eastern Med.

The Guide Marine at http://www.meteofrance.fr/publications/nos-collections/guides-pratiques/guide-marine is useful.
 
many thanks guys.
Thanks to Frank Singleton for the advice here and his excellent site...........a really good example of someone who has acquired a lot of knowledge then spent time and effort making it available for numpties like me!!
Franks site is really excellent!
 
pcatterall said:
Many thanks guys. I am certainly considering Navtex, are there any recommendations as to which model is best?...
Click to expand...

I have a Furuno 300D installed which I'm very happy with. The sensitivity is good so if there is a signal it'll probably receive it - to the extent that it makes sense to only program in the station identifiers you actually want. Down the Portuguese coast I was getting Puerto Rico at night and in Med Spain I got Turkish stations.

Around the med its not my primary weather info tool but it is very good for navigation warnings - dead whales, floating nets, live firing areas :eek: etc etc
 
Last edited:
RobbieW said:
I have a Furuno 300D installed which I'm very happy with. The sensitivity is good so if there is a signal it'll probably receive it - to the extent that it makes sense to only program in the station identifiers you actually want. Down the Portuguese coast I was getting Puerto Rico at night and in Med Spain I got Turkish stations.

Around the med its not my primary weather info tool but it is very good for navigation warnings - dead whales, floating nets, live firing areas :eek: etc etc
Click to expand...

I have had a NASA NAVTEX PRO and now have a Furuno 300D. Like RobbieW, I am very happy with it. In my case, mainly for the size of the display. I never thought that it received any better than the old NASA set and that was confirmed when we were at anchor near boats with NASA sets.

Like RobbieW I did not make a great deal of use of the NAVTEX for weather as I normally had Internet access. However, as he says it is really useful for NAV warnings. In the Adriatic, using VHF, we had to listen through Nav warnings in two other languages before the English. With NAVTEX it was always there in English. For weather it is a reassuring back-up. I would not be without it wherever I sail.

Long distance, night time propagation is an inescapable problem with NAVTEX. There really is no answer to it. It is a consequence of the frequency used and that is determined by the requirement of range – ie up tp around200 miles..
 
pcatterall said:
Thanks guys.
Final question is 518khz ok or do I need dual frequency?
I see there is an old NAV 4 on ebay ( the one with the chart paper) are these still useable? in some ways I like the idea of a print out.
Click to expand...


Most countries use 490 Hz for national language versions of what is on 518 Hz. As far as I know, the UK is the only country to use 490 for other information.

So, for Med use, no, you do not need 490. It would only be a back-up.
 
It has no paper, but a great screen. There is one on eBay (not mine!). I was just offering a personal suggestion. I'm moving to the SOF in March and from my research it will adapt with out a hick up.
 
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