NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Problem with a sextant
From: Bill B
Date: 2006 Apr 26, 20:19 -0500
From: Bill B
Date: 2006 Apr 26, 20:19 -0500
Peter wrote > An inaccurate DR will lead to longer intercepts, an inherent enemy of > accuracy. The remedy is to take the indicated Fix as an improved DR and repeat > the sight reduction exercise. > > Incidentally, methods of sight reduction that use a presumed DR expressed in > whole degrees suffer the same inherent defect. From reading this List, and > other sources, such methods seem the most popular today; presumably because > they remain the main methods taught. An example of the triumph of inertia over > an informed mind. I am at the point that I can whip out Hc and Zn in 3-4 minutes on my TI-30XA (3 memories) with no paper or pencil needed from any AP I wish. I am glad that I learned a tabular method first as it gave me a better understanding of what was going on, and provides me with a backup to calculator methods. I do agree I prefer a short intercept. Regarding long intercepts and accuracy, the offset table can to help nudge a point on a an LOP a long distance from the intercept to better approximate the COP. Bill