NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Ebbco sextant
From: Dan Allen
Date: 1999 Jan 25, 11:10 AM
From: Dan Allen
Date: 1999 Jan 25, 11:10 AM
I have the inexpensive Davis and I have not been impressed. Screws have fallen out of the mirror holder, leaving it unusable. Even before this, its accuracy was quite poor. If you think you are going to seriously want to do celestial nav and have it as a backup (or primary!) source of position for a major ocean passage, treat yourself to the Astra IIIb for $450. It is all metal and will delight you far more than plastic will. I did this and it helped me get over the hump of just toying around with celestial to becoming really dedicated and serious about learning how to use a sextant. Or look around for a good used sextant. You can often find other metal sextants in the $200-$500 range if you look for a few months, or try www.ebay.com. Spending MORE than $500 for a sextant doesn't buy you much, but I think every dollar spent up to around $500 is worth it. Dan Allen danallen@microsoft.com -----Original Message----- From John K Simmonds [mailto:mobi@netconnect.com.au] Sent: Sunday, January 24, 1999 4:06 AM To: carl Cc: navigation@roninhouse.com Subject: Re: [Fwd: [Nml] Ebbco sextant] Actually, imho, the Davis (either model) makes a good learning instrument (especially teaches adjustment and the need to check prior to use) and when you move on to a metal instrument, makes an excellent backup cheers, John carl wrote: > I don't know about the Ebbco, but I have both a Davis Mark 3 and a Mark > 25. The 25 has pretensions to being a serious sextant--for $175. A > couple of years ago the cover of Ocean Navigator showed a navigator > taking a sight in fairly rough seas with a Mark 25. It's not that it's > not accurate--just it takes a lot of fiddling with the mirrors to keep > it in adjustment. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=-= =-= TO UNSUBSCRIBE, send this message to majordomo@roninhouse.com: =-= =-= navigation =-= =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=-=