NavList:

I just finished reading Flying From the Black Hole documenting the navigator's job on a B-52, which I heartily recommend. I decided to finally set up my sextant mount so that I could see what it was like to take sights this way. I have attached several photos showing the set up which I made with some two by twos and a round plywood disk. I provide the 28 volts for the lights by using a sprinkler system transformer, that's the little black box on top of the stand. Photo 6415 shows the top of the periscope extending above the fuselage (er, disk.)  Photo 6416 shows the azimuth crank with the azimuth readout window to the left of the crank. Photo 6417 shows the azimuth counter with the azimuth of the sun, 246.0° entered. Photo 6423 shows the power cable conecting the sextant to the mount. Photo 6428 is a view through the eyepiece showing the sun (through a green filter) near the left edge of the bubble. Below the bubble is the "inverse relative bearing scale" showing the hairline on 164.5° (I had trouble taking the picture through the eyepiece.) You set in the precomputed altitude into the sextant and you set the azimuth of the body into the azimuth counter and then turn the sextant until the aircraft's heading is under the hairline and the body will be in the field of view. By aligning the body with the hairline you can read out the exact heading of the aircraft and so provide a check of the aircraft compass' deviation. This is all the view a B-52 navigator would have of the sky so it was absolutely essential that the data be precomputed so the the sextant could be aimed in the right direction or else it would be almost impossible to find the star he needed to shoot. (My sextant mount was set up, randomly, on a heading of 165° True which I found out by lining up on the sun.)

gl