NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Star-star distances for arc error
From: Douglas Denny
Date: 2009 Jun 19, 01:57 -0700
From: Douglas Denny
Date: 2009 Jun 19, 01:57 -0700
I've done this. It provides a method of checking a sextant but is not easy with accuracy unless you have some clamping system to hold the sextant still and be able to rotate the sextant into alignment. If you use horizontal angles with stars approximately of the same declination the refraction element is negligable if they are above say 30 degrees. Most sextants only read with accuracy to about a half of a minute of arc anyway. Star distances can be calculated from declinations/ RA (or hour angles) with simple spherical trig. Douglas Denny. Chichester. England. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Navigation List archive: www.fer3.com/arc To post, email NavList@fer3.com To , email NavList-@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
