
NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Need help to track down errors
From: Gary LaPook
Date: 2008 Nov 13, 12:06 -0800
From: Gary LaPook
Date: 2008 Nov 13, 12:06 -0800
To keep this in perspective, a 2.1 second error is only 213 feet!
glapook@PACBELL.NET wrote:
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glapook@PACBELL.NET wrote:
I found some additional discrepancies between my 1970 edition of H.O 249 and the online version. For example, on page 151 of volume 2, the first entry (LAT 25, DEC 0, LHA 70) shows 18º 04' in the 170 edition and 18º 03' in the online version, a difference of one minute of arc. There are additional one minute discrepancies on this page and on other pages. I was going to point out this additional discrepancy to the government office but decided to check these computations myself. Using the standard sin cosine formula I computed the Hc for this example and calculated an Hc of 18º 03' 27.9" which should be rounded to 18º 03' showing that the incorrect value is in the 1970 edition. I checked some of the other discrepancies and got the same result, the online version has the correct values and the 1970 edition contains the errors. The "errors" are extremely small, my example results from a 2.1" error in the 1970 computation resulting in rounding off in the wrong direction to the wrong whole minute which would result in a half mile error in the LOP. But, if rounded in the other direction you would still have a half mile error in the LOP, only in the opposite direction so this is nothing to get real upset about since you are expecting only a one NM accuracy in LOPs when using H.O. 249. Since the math is straight forward I wonder why the original computations were off by even this small amount. gl On Nov 13, 5:14 am, glap...@PACBELL.NET wrote:I sent this email today to the government office that computed these tables: Dear Mr. Doherty, Last year I called your attention to some errors I had found in the on- line version of H.O. 249 for Hc's near zero and I checked recently and these appear now to have been corrected. However, when I was reviewing the updated version I found some additional errors. In volume 2 page 158 is completely wrong and appears to be a duplicate of page 152 and page 133 is also completely wrong and appears to be a duplicate of page 139! I suspect that there are many other similar errors hiding in this volume that my cursory review didn't reveal. Gary LaPook On Nov 13, 3:34 am, glap...@PACBELL.NET wrote:Further comparison shows that page 133 is a duplicate of page 139!glOn Nov 13, 1:56 am, glap...@PACBELL.NET wrote:Ken,My copy, 1970 edition, doesn't have the error you pointed out. I then looked at all pages from 122 through 161 looking at the first entry on each of these pages and found additional differences between my print edition and the online version. Page 155 has a one minute different Hc as does page 151 for the first entry but I didn't check other values. page 133 is completely different, all tabulations are different ! I computed several of the entries on page 133 and found that the online version has the erroneous values while my 1970 edition has the correct values.glOn Nov 12, 4:08 pm, Ken Gebhart <GEBH...@CELESTAIRE.COM> wrote:To all List Members,Need help to track down errors!I have been made aware of many errors on page 158 of Pub 249 Vol 2 Apparently all of the Hc values on the page are wrong! For example, for dec 0, LHA 0, Lat 26 (page 158), Hc is shown as 65 deg. When it should be 64 deg by simple inspection. All the other numbers are also off by varying amounts as can be found by computation. There are some other errors too, of a different kind on other pages. For example, page 160. Look at the column for dec 15 deg, and go down to LHA 98. By simple inspection you can see that there should be a minus sign before Hc 00-25, but it is not there. I believe this is typical of many Hcs near zero.These errors are present in the US Government Edition, privately published editions, and the PDF on the NGA website. I have spoken to the UK Almanac Office, and they report that the errors do not exist in their equivalent to 249 V2, or their Rapid Sight Reduction Tables, and can find no trace or knowledge of them.I am asking anyone who has an older copy of this volume, to check it for these errors and report the publication date. Maybe we can track down when they first appeared. By the way, a friend did phone the NGA to report this, and was told that “they would look into it”.Thanks, Ken Gebhart
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