What I’ve Been Building Lately: SatBench, My Weather and Satellite Side Project

As I’ve been getting TechInform going again, one of the big questions in my own head has been: what have I actually been building while this site was quiet?

A big part of that answer is SatBench.com.

Over the last six months or so, SatBench has been one of my main side projects — and easily one of the most fun. It sits right at the intersection of weather, data, self-hosting, and web design, which is apparently the perfect recipe for me to turn one idea into something much bigger than I originally planned.

At a basic level, SatBench.com is my weather, satellite, and local atmospheric data platform. But like most good side projects, it’s grown into a little more than the one-line description.

So, What Is SatBench?

SatBench.com is a self-hosted platform I built to bring together local weather data, real satellite imagery, and a custom web interface in one place.

The original idea was pretty simple: I wanted a better way to view weather conditions from my own setup instead of relying entirely on whatever a generic weather app happened to show. Over time, that turned into something that pulls in live data from my personal weather station, combines it with satellite and weather imagery, and presents it through a site I can build and shape exactly how I want.

So it’s not just a basic weather page.

SatBench has become more like a personal weather portal — part dashboard, part satellite viewer, part archive, and part experiment in building a weather site that actually feels modern and enjoyable to use.

Why I Built It

A lot of weather tools fall into one of two categories: really useful but kind of ugly, or polished-looking but limited once you want something more custom.

I wanted something that could do both.

I wanted a platform that could show my own local conditions, handle real imagery, look clean, and feel like an actual product instead of a bunch of widgets taped together. I also wanted something that reflected my own setup and interests a little better than a standard weather service ever could.

That’s really what SatBench became for me — a place to mix hardware, software, data, and design into one project that feels personal.

What It Includes

Without turning this into a massive technical breakdown, the short version is that SatBench brings together a few main pieces.

One side is my local weather station data — things like temperature, humidity, pressure, wind, rain, and current conditions. Another side is the satellite piece, where I’ve been working with GOES imagery and other weather visuals. Then there’s the website itself, which is the layer that turns all of that into something actually viewable, useful, and a little more polished than the average hobby project.

That mix is what makes it interesting to me. It’s not just about collecting data, and it’s not just about displaying images. It’s about building a system that pulls all of those inputs together into one cohesive experience.

What It’s Been Like Working On It

A lot of my time before getting back into TechInform went into shaping SatBench into something real.

Not just functional, but something with its own identity.

That meant improving the interface, making the weather side more readable, refining how data is presented, making the satellite side feel more integrated, and generally pushing it away from “cool experiment” and closer to “this is an actual platform.” It also gave me a good excuse to spend more time with self-hosted tools, automation, and visual design — which are all things I tend to come back to anyway.

Honestly, working on SatBench is part of what made me want to get back into writing here again. It reminded me how much I enjoy building things that are practical, a little niche, and fun to obsess over.

Trevor Score

This isn’t a formal review — it’s just how I felt using this thing. A gut-check from someone who actually used it.

Trevor Score: 9/10 — A weather project that started as “just an idea” and turned into one of the most rewarding things I’ve built in a while.

It gets a 9 from me because SatBench feels like the kind of project that really reflects what I enjoy about tech: building something useful, making it look good, and slowly turning it into something bigger than the original plan. The missing point is just because projects like this are never really finished — which is also part of the fun.

Final Verdict

SatBench has been one of the biggest things I’ve been working on over the last six months, and it’s a pretty good snapshot of where my head has been lately.

Yes, it’s a self-hosted weather and satellite platform. But more than that, it’s been a project that gave me room to experiment, build, refine, and obsess over details in a way that felt really satisfying. It’s technical, visual, and a little niche — which probably explains exactly why I enjoyed making it.

And as I get TechInform moving again, it felt worth sharing, because this is the kind of project that filled the gap between then and now.

Sometimes six quiet months turn into a weather platform.

If you want the cleanest version, I’d slightly tighten the first mention to:

A big part of that answer is SatBench.com, my weather and satellite side project.