On 7/15/06, Eben King <eben01@verizon.net> wrote:
> On Sat, 15 Jul 2006, Chuck Hast wrote:
>
> > On 7/15/06, Eben King <eben01@verizon.net> wrote:
> >> I'm talking to a guy who has a lightning detection rig, shown here:
> >>
> >> http://members.home.nl/fkooiman/lightning/index.htm
> >>
> >> What I have a question about is that its driver is: " Visual Basic
> >> program that detects the direction to the source of the lightning strike
> >> with an accuracy of 1 degree". Is there any way to run VB in Linux, or
> >> to translate that code to something that _can_ be run?
> >
> > You might want to start with this....
> >
> > http://www.baudline.com/
> >
> > This tool can have up to 9 input channels, (you already have two which are
> > the left and right audio channels on your sound card, a second card will
> > add two more channels.
>
> Ah! I have an onboard sound card which I'm not using (my SB Live! is much
> better).
>
> > Looking at what the guy is doing with the hardware/software, I assume that
> > he is using the two antennas to obtain gross vector data, and he is
> > probably also rotating the antennas electronicly in order to get the
> > vector data he needs to determine the direction that the dischange came
> > from.
>
> If by that you mean no physical motion of the antennas occurs, then I agree.
> The received amplitude of a signal is proportional to something like the
> cosine of the angle between "straight ahead" and "toward the source". This
> means the received amplitude of the other antenna is proportional to its
> sine, and hence their ratio is proportional to its tangent.
>
> > You will probably need to do the same thing, but I think that you can
> > probably work with baudline to be a display for your data. Baudline is
> > pretty good about working with you on such things to,
>
> > The more channels (antennas) you can add to it the better the resolution
> > and other data.
>
> I'd need access to another site with a similar setup, the further away the
> better (as long as their ranges overlap), to locate the strikes on a map by
> triangulation. That and a method of clock synchronization.
>
I did not look too hard at it, but figured that there was some sort of dual
site system in order to get the az data. Two or more of them at different
locations, linked over some link (radio or wire) and now you have the
source of the az data.
If you have a second device to test, I can set it up here and you could
use this as your second site so you would have the az data to the dis-
charge locations.
-- Chuck Hast -- KP4DJT -- To paraphrase my flight instructor; "the only dumb question is the one you DID NOT ask resulting in my going out and having to identify your bits and pieces in the midst of torn and twisted metal." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This list is provided as an unmoderated internet service by Networked Knowledge Systems (NKS). Views and opinions expressed in messages posted are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of NKS or any of its employees.
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