NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Another Davis Instruments Mark 15 Question
From: Rodney Myrvaagnes
Date: 2003 Mar 2, 19:34 -0500
From: Rodney Myrvaagnes
Date: 2003 Mar 2, 19:34 -0500
On Mon, 3 Mar 2003 09:48:22 +1100, Peter Fogg wrote:
>Not having personal experience of plastic sextants, having early been warned
>away from them, but reading with interest these postings; my feeling is that
>they have been effectively damned with faint praise ...
You may choose to read it that way, but wrongly? A Davis, used with
care for index error between sights, will get you on soundings wherever
you want to go. I have a nice but heavy Kelvin-Hughes so I have no need
of the Davis, but if I had no sextant I would buy a Davis if budget
mattered at all.
If you are navigating from a boat less than 50 feet long, the motion of
the boat may well outweigh any difference in sextants.
Except, for the esthetic pleasure of handling something nice. If I
could have afforded it, I would have bought a C Plath classic, but not
because it would offer me any practical use.
What I would not buy (again) is the $50 EBBCO I learned on. That was
exceedingly unpleasant (i.e. horrible) to use. I trust George's is a
better model.
Rodney Myrvaagnes NYC
J36 Gjo/a
"Curse thee, thou quadrant. No longer will I guide my earthly way by thee." Capt. Ahab
