"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:Y7OZa.121718$uu5.17371@sccrnsc04...
So, I thought, why not adapt a marine radar unit to aircraft use?

Granted, I know very little about marine radar, but just given the
application, I'd suspect that it would not have characteristics suitable for
aviation. For one, all of the marine radar installations I've seen use a
rotating antenna, which would be hard to find a place to mount on a plane.
Beyond that, I don't know what the range of a cheap marine radar is, but
I'll bet it's significantly shorter than an aviation unit. Also, my
understanding is that marine radar is designed to optimize imaging of other
watercraft and coastlines, not weather.

Far be it from me to dissuade someone from trying. But I sure wouldn't hold
my breath waiting to see if they were successful.

I'd rather have both radar and lightning detection, but I agree that the
lightning detection gives you much more utility for the money.

Pete