NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Metal 3-Arm Protractor "Handedness" (Station Pointer)
From: Erik A
Date: 2025 Sep 2, 09:32 -0700
From: Erik A
Date: 2025 Sep 2, 09:32 -0700
Celestial Navigation Adjacent Question. I was mucking around with 3 object fixes (angles taken with an horizontal sextant) the other day and got to thinking about 3-Armed Protractors. Setting aside the cheap W&P plastic ones for a moment, I noticed that some of the more expensive metal ones (mostly historic) are sometimes described as being either "Right-Handed" or "Left-Handed." A Google search yeilded near-nothing save for the AI's best guesses about ergonomics of the navigator, which seems dubious at best. Does anyone know what this "handedness" of a station pointer is about and what the use case for either left or right actualy is (or would have been)?
