On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 13:57:25 GMT, "Roger Long"
wrote:
I'm kind of surprised that worked. VOR's are so hard to pick up on
the ground that they broadcast a special test frequency at airports
for calibrating them. The signals are optimized for pick up in the
air and don't seem to hug the ground very well. Sometimes, you'll
even lose them in the air at low altitudes.

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They were more popular on sailboats where mast height gives some
additional range. They were popular for coastal cruisers and racers
for a while because they were easier to use and more accurate than an
RDF. One of the biggest problems with RDF was that in addition to
determining bearing to the transmitter, you also needed an accurate
boat heading at the same instant. I would take the RDF bearing and
yell "mark" at the moment I had it. My wife had to note the compass
heading at the same time that I yelled. We would repeat this several
times and average the results. If you were plus or minus 2 or 3
degrees, that was a good LOP. On a 3 bearing fix from 10 miles
offshore, your uncertainty triangle was frequently 1 mile on each
side.

With VOR, all you had to do was read the bearing from the dial,
usually accurate to about 1 or 2 degrees.