Hey, I thought you'd be happy that I endorsed your approach as being appropriate
while onboard. I'm certainly not "desperate," since its pretty clear to
everyone that jaxie is just doing his typical jackass thing.

BTW, I tried my graphical method this morning - dividers on the compass rose -
and with a clear head and two cups of coffee, had no trouble getting a very
accurate result. Of course, in practice one usually doesn't need to know the
strength of a current to 1%, but it isn't impossible to calculate it.

I'd certainly agree that all navigators must know how to do "set and drift"
problems graphically. But there are also a large number of navigators that use
computers or calculators, so using tools like this are not out of the question.
And the trig involved is really quite simple. I see nothing wrong with keeping
in practice by solving a few problems a year with this method.

BTW, I didn't use "log tables," its been a very long time since I've done that!
However, the tables, along with trig tables, have been published in Bowditch and
other navigation texts for over 200 years. They certainly ARE part of the
traditional navigator's toolbox.



"Donal" wrote in message
...

"Jeff Morris" wrote in message
...

Donal was the only person besides to even attempt both problems. He did
it
graphically, which is appropriate. I worked it out with trig to double
check
Donal's work.

Hey! I'd be grateful if you would stop using me to back up your position.
You wrote off my initial answer as being little better than Jax's. I think
that you must be feeling a bit desperate if you are now trying to use me in
your argument against Jax.

I worked out my answer using a Breton plotter, and a bit of paper, at 20
minutes to midnight, on a Saturday, after a meal and a bottle of wine. You
used log tables, at 9:30 am. I feel that I have nothing to be ashamed of.

I don't consider log tables to be part of the traditional navivator's
toolbox.

I've done this sort of nav for real, at sea.. .... many times. I do it to
within 1* of accuracy. If you need to use log tables, *or* if you need to
be able to calculate square roots, then you shouldn't consider yourself to
be capable of doing navigation. You are both as bad as each other.

Regards


Donal
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