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How do i set up my weathervane to point North.I have a compass but find it difficult to set it up accuretly.Regards gregory_p3

gregory_p3 wrote:How do i set up my weathervane to point North.I have a compass but find it difficult to set it up accuretly.Regards gregory_p3

You need to align it with true north, not magnetic north. The easiest way (for me) is to find a landmark on the OS map which is due north and align with that. It's all wide open spaces around here, so that may not be so easy for everyone. If you have to use a compass, you will need to take magnetic variation into account; there's a calculator here: http://www.nearby.org.uk/gma_calc.cgi

Thanks for your help an advice steve,will do what you have suggested.Peter

1. Use a permanent marker to mark or highlight the South on head unit.
2. Stand some distance away with a compass and to the south of the unit
3. Move to your left or right watching the compass, until the unit is to your true north (making allowance for your local magnetic variation). 4. Now get someone to turn the unit, until the south mark is looking directly towards you.

Alternative method with no use of compass...

On a sunny day, at exactly 12:00, turn the head so the shadow on the head starts equidistant at either side of the south mark on the head. A similar shadow process can be used to align a sat dish.

harrym1byt wrote:On a sunny day, at exactly 12:00,

To be pedantic - at exactly solar noon.

Go onto Google Maps, switch to Sat view. Look at location of your station and pick something straight up the page (North) or straight down the page (South) to use as a landmark for alignment.

RCE wrote:Go onto Google Maps, switch to Sat view. Look at location of your station and pick something straight up the page (North) or straight down the page (South) to use as a landmark for alignment.

Set mine up in the garden today and that is exactly what I did.
Centred on the point in the garden where the unit was going and then headed north and picked out a couple of items on the map to allow me to guage north.
Fitted in perfictly with my 'gut feeling' as well

I did much the same using Google maps - satellite view. My station is on a field boundary and this is just a few degrees off due north. I used the boundary and the few degrees correction when setting up the weather vane. The detail in Google maps is amazing! It's even better in the towns and cities.

Hiya,

If you can't see any landmarks, by using Google Maps and the Digital TV website you can work out where your TV aerial is pointing. In theory (if your aerial is corectly aligned) you can use this as your datum to find North. This works really well if the aerial and your wind vane are mounted close by each other, perhaps on the same chimney etc.

Chat soon.

My house was build in '63 with my weatherstation in mind. It is oriented exatly east-west