Need some direction

[W3DRM]

so maybe you guys might know then HOW DOES ONE GET historical lightning data free or not? Looks like I may invest in some Boltek equipment(does this work with your system?). but I need past data as well. so far it seems almost impossible to find! USPLN will provide a report for like insurance claims and stuff but I'm not interested in that I want data I can graph and overlay on heatmaps

The Blitzortung system is not compatible with any other lightning detection system.

I would suggest joining the WXFORUM (http://www.wxforum.net/index.php). There is a lot of info available there on weather stations, lightning, Boltek and Blitzortung. It is not affiliated with any equipment manufacturer or software developer so it gives you a pretty good non-biased viewpoint of just about any weather related topic.

I am not aware of any FREE resource for historical weather data such as you are inquiring about.