NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Single-handed sights
From: Gary LaPook
Date: 2007 Oct 22, 12:48 -0700
From: Gary LaPook
Date: 2007 Oct 22, 12:48 -0700
Gary LaPook writes: I use the inverse of your method, I start counting seconds from the time of the sight until I can look at my watch, never more than 3 seconds so less opportunity for the count to get off by any significant amount. I use a digital watch that has a push button for illumination at night. I check its error after the round of sights using a more accurate watch or radio time signal. gl On Oct 22, 10:29 am, Lu Abelwrote: > Gary J. LaPook wrote: > > Gary LaPook wrote: > > > I use one of those little hand held dictaphones. I put it in my shirt > > pocket, start it recording and then just talk into it with the sextant > > altitude and time.M uch easier than trying to juggle sextant, pencil and > > paper especially if taking many sights. Go below and play it back and > > write down the figures. > > I think everyone's experience will be different, but at one point in > learning celestial I took a lot of sights without a helper. > > How? First, I pre-adjusted my sextant to be close to the expected Hs. > Then I looked at my watch and noted time to the second. Then I simply > started counting one-one hundred, two-two hundred, ... while I adjusted > my sextant to its final reading. Then noted time and reading in my > notebook. > > With this method, you should be able to get a sextant reading within 15 > to 20 seconds of starting counting. I did a few trial runs of simply my > time counting to make sure I wasn't counting too fast or slow. I > believe that even after 30 seconds I was within one second or less. > > I was taking sights from a known position and my readings were no less > accurate than what I got when using a helper on previous expeditions. > > Lu Abel --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to NavList@fer3.com To , send email to NavList-@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---