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A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Andy Smith
Date: 2017 Jun 23, 02:50 -0700
I recently took a gamble and bought a Freiberger sextant of eBay. The price seemed okay and the sextant was described as 'pristine'. Now, the sextant delivered was not the same serial number as the one I bought. It was a Freiberger 'Sirius', considerably newer than the one bought and supposedly more accurate than the standard model, but it was most definitely not in pristine condition. It was dirty, and the horizon mirror adjustment screws were stripped.
I immediately emailed the seller and suggested he could send me a new horizon mirror frame, or I could return the sextant as what was delivered was not what I ordered. The seller replied in minutes, apologising for his mistake in sending the wrong sextant and said he would post a new horizon mirror frame that very day. I was pleasantly surprised when, five days later, a small parcel arrived containing a brand new, never been fitted, still in the box horizon mirror frame, a new horizon mirror, and full set of mirror clips and screws (including those for the index mirror).
Faith restored, I stripped and cleaned the sextant before reassembling with the new parts (Thank you Bill Morris for the Freiberger/SNO-T guide)
I've taken a number of sunsights, both ashore and afloat, and am very pleased with the results.
For those who may be looking to acquire a sextant the vendor is based in India and trades as [link removed: email Andy Smith if interested].