NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Early sextants & Lunars...
From: Alexandre Eremenko
Date: 2014 Mar 26, 20:48 +0000
From: Alexandre Eremenko
Date: 2014 Mar 26, 20:48 +0000
Bill, You wrote: >Most sextants of the time are divided to read to 10 seconds, but it is very difficult to decide which pair or even 3 or 4 pairs of lines coincide when reading > >the verniers. I look either side to see which two pairs just do _not_ coincide and choose the middle value between them. This depends on the size. Most Heath sextants I've seen on e-bay and elsewhere have 6 to 7 inches radius, while Lecky says: "A 6 or 7 inch sextant is of course somewhat lighter to handle, but sailors are not women... The writer's instrument is a 10 inch pillar by Troughton..." It is certainly easier to read the verinet on a 10" sextant. Alex.
