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I wrote previously:
"Lunars were no longer used much after 1850, and that's because chronometers 
had become cheap and reliable. It was easier to buy two chronometers than to 
pay for the high-quality sextant required for lunar observations."

And Geoffrey, you replied:
"So... do you mean that a marine chronometer was half the price of a
good sextant in 1850? Gosh!
What was the price of marine chronometers and good sextants in the US in 1850?"

I think by my logic above I was suggesting that one EXTRA chronometer was more 
economical than one (good) sextant --not half the price. :-)

But I've done only the most trivial research on the economics of navigation 
equipment so I won't defend this specific claim. From my notes from five 
years ago, in Britain in 1840, a new chronometer was selling for about 40 
pounds, down from something like 200 pounds at the end of the 18th century, 
while a new (high-quality) sextant would sell for about 20 pounds, about the 
same price as fifty years earlier. These prices in 1840 are close enough that 
economics would play a major role. The ratio of chronometer price to sextant 
price has fallen from 10-to-1 to 2-to-1. And I couldn't guess about actual 
sale prices for "second-hand" instruments. What would be the price for a 
five-year-old high-quality sextant? And the price for a five-year-old 
chronometer? 

I have no information at hand on US prices in the same period.

-FER




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