The LD-250 can warn of both close and severe thunderstorms. If a storm is detectedcloser than a preset distance or the strike rate exceeds a preset limit, theLD-250 sounds its internal alarm and activates the computers alarm tone or WAVfile notification. Both the Close Storm and Severe Storm alarm statuses are indicatedon the LD-250's front panel.
Strike rates, both Close Strikes / Minute and Total Strikes / Minute are shown for the previous hour on the Strike Rate Trend Graph letting you easily see ifstorms are increasing in severity or dying off.
Three display ranges, 100, 200 and 300 miles (160, 320 and 480 km) allow youto zoom into the region of interest. Zoom out to the maximum range of 300 miles(600 miles across) or zoom in to 100 miles to see only the nearby storms.
LD-250 lightning data is live! Your computer beeps and displays the strike withinmilliseconds of the strike happening! With the LD-250 Lightning Detector youare actually detecting the lightning strikes themselves. There are no on-lineor recurring charges of any kind.
The LD-250 connects to your computer's RS232 port making it suitable for usewith both laptop and desktop computers. The LD-250 will even detect lightningwhen your computer is turned off. When the LD-250 starts beeping or the Strikelight starts flashing you can turn on your computer to see where the storms arelocated
LD-250 Lightning Detector has two built-in alarms: a Close Storm Alarm and aSevere Storm Alarm. The Close Storm Alarm will activate if a thunderstorm isdetected closer than a preset distance. The Severe Thunderstorm Alarm activatesif the number of lightning strikes per minute exceeds a preset limit.
The LD-250 will sound an alarm tone when either alarm activates. Front panelpushbuttons allow both the Strike tone and Alarm tones to be disabled.
The computer can also be configured to sound an alarm tone and/or pop up a notificationwindow when an alarm activates. Alarm status is indicated by the colour of theClose Storm distance circle and Severe Storm status indicator in the top leftcorner of the map window.
Connect your GPS or marine compass to your LD-250 and track lightning from yourcar, truck or boat.
Turn on the LD-250's heading indicator when running mobile. The blue trianglein the centre of the screen rotates as your vehicle turns to show the LD-250is using your GPS or marine compass to correct for changes in your vehicle'sdirection.
The LD-250 uses a small active antenna to receive the radio signals from lightningstrikes. These signals are the crackling you hear on an AM radio during a thunderstorm.The direction-finding antenna antenna is able to tell which direction the signalis coming from. The software measures the strength of the received signals toestimate distance Special signal processing in software reduces the effects ofstrike-to-strike energy variations providing more accurate distance information.
The antenna may be mounted indoors (in a wood framed house for example) or outdoors.For mobile installations it is mounted outside on the roof of the vehicle.