PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Navigaion -determining position with ref. to the Sun/Moon
Old 1st January 2006 | 13:35
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From: MIRSI hold - give or take...
A crude sextant can be constructed using a protractor & a piece of string with a bob @ the end. When approaching midday, don (several of) your sunglasses and aim the protractor at the lower edge of the sun disc, then take note of the angle between the protrctor & local vertical (the piece of string & its bob).

Next, correct for the suns declination. At summer solstice, subtract 23,5 deg. in the nortern hemisphere, winter solstice add 23,5 deg, and at equinox, the correction is zero. If an almanac is at hand, it'll give you the exact declination, otherwise a sine curve drawn to connect these points in a grid will do nicely. This procedure corrects for the earths axis being offset 23,5 deg. from the ecliptic plane.

The value you arrive at is called the "co-lattitude" - subtract it from 90 to get your present lattitude.

If you have a watch that runs to any known timezone, you can also work out your longtitude by noting exactly at what time you measured the maximum sum elevation and appplying a correction of 15 deg. lat per hour difference (all time zones start at the longtitude that is divisible by 15, apart from the Z time zone, which obviously is zero).

And if you have an almanac, a bubble sextant & a decent calculator (plus a high frustration threshold) - you can get a position line from the moon But if you're so well equipped, I'd stay with shooting 5-7 stars to get intersecting position lines, the stars are much nicer to deal with, and - unless you have a lot of practice in using a sextant (not to mention the calculator!) - are far more likely to get you a decent result

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