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A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Ed Popko
Date: 2019 Feb 3, 08:58 -0800
Mike,
All reductions were done with Frank's online Lunars Calculator with standard defaults for temperature and pressure. They are super easy to recreate. All the data needed is in the post (lat/long, date, body, time, limb...).
BTW, I also used Frank's GPS Anti Spoof app for GMT time and his Lunars Predictor for both GMT time bracket and initial sextant preset. It's always really nice to see the other body show up over the moon on first glance. Just a matter of moving the body to the near or far limb from there and start your observations. The Anti Spoof app beats using my hack watch any day and the smartphone gives off enough light to illuminate my note paper too. It doesn't get any easier.
Perhaps the everpresent big challenge, other than taking the sights and their times, is knowing your sextant's IE exactly. Sighthing stars is the best way to determine IE. I take star sights before and after each observation series to know the IE. Perhaps it's overkill. Stan Klein (I miss him, a really good guy) showed me tricks in reading the Astra IIIB vernier to 0.1' even though the scales are every 0.2'.
Ed
