Ozdork,
While a few peoples posts in this thread obviously show a good deal of knowledge on this subject and there is certainly plenty to learn to try and gain even a basic level of competency and understanding the accuracy of this navigation method whilst using instruments such as a sextant etc I don't think is particularly good.
Years ago I saw several documentaries talking to RAF navigators from Bomber Command and they said that using the instruments they had, bubble sextant etc for astronav as 4Greens mentioned, that
the best they could get as far as positional accuracy was to fix the position of the airfield where they were at, whilst on the ground, within 5 miles of its actual location.
In the air it was far less accurate and as someone mentioned on a pitching boat deck likely to be less so again.
I remember at the time thinking that 5 odd mile radius figure wasn't very good especially if you were standing still when taking the star shots etc, but maybe that is considered very good for this form of navigation??
Can anybody comment on what sort of accuracy could be expected under ideal conditions ??
For those Bomber Command guys +/- 5 miles may not be bad on a long flight, especially at nite with no navaids or lights etc to help keep you on a general course etc but in those days with all the nav errors compiling during the flight and the navigator using an airplot method rather than a trackplot method there wasn't much accuracy in the bomb dropping for eg, especially at night as was proven at the time in published RAF accuracy studies and assessments.
When astronav done with electronic equipment its quite a bit more accurate,as we would expect, LOL. for eg the SR71 recon aircraft astronav equipment, from the mid 1960s-
Not too shabby for 50 years ago, LOL. Anyway back to you and your sextant etc, keep us posted on your progress, this form of nav is an obviously dying art and in certain applications it shouldn't be.
The stars cant be switched off or interfered with like GPS, all you need is clear skies, the tools and the know how to use them.
