Hi group,

I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder. All of the compasses I've found online
have a hemispherical glass face, which makes them useless for taking a
bearing. I also strongly suspect that hand-held bearing compasses are
useless on a steel boat such as mine.

The only flat-faced gimballed compasses I've found are desk
decorations.

I'm looking for something similar to a real ship's compass, without
the giant compensating balls & bar (I will compensate it with
magnets). Anyone know where they can be bought?

Regards,
-Maxime Camirand

max camirand wrote:

I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder.

You don't say where in the world you are. Here in Denmark, my first choice
would be Weilbach in Copenhagen - they've been in the business of compasses,
charts, etc since 1755 or so. I have sailed on a ship that has one of their
compasses, gimballed and with a flat face. Haven't tried with a direction-
finder, but it looks like it ought to work well. Big thing, probably
approved to be used on much bigger ships that ours...

http://www.weilbach.dk/netbutik.asp?...fold4479&l=155

-H

On Dec 3, 1:54*pm, Heikki wrote:
max camirand wrote:
I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder.

You don't say where in the world you are. Here in Denmark, my first choice
would be Weilbach in Copenhagen - they've been in the business of compasses,
charts, etc since 1755 or so. I have sailed on a ship that has one of their
compasses, gimballed and with a flat face. Haven't tried with a direction-
finder, but it looks like it ought to work well. Big thing, probably
approved to be used on much bigger ships that ours...

http://www.weilbach.dk/netbutik.asp?...fold4479&l=155

-H

Thanks for the link!
Sorry for the oversight: The boat is in Seattle, USA.
Those compasses look excellent, but they're very expensive. Maybe I
shouldn't have any illusions about getting a good compass for little
money, but I hope I can find a commercial ship outfitter that carries
a decent product at non-yacht prices.

-m

max camirand wrote:
On Dec 3, 1:54 pm, Heikki wrote:
max camirand wrote:
I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder.
You don't say where in the world you are. Here in Denmark, my first choice
would be Weilbach in Copenhagen - they've been in the business of compasses,
charts, etc since 1755 or so. I have sailed on a ship that has one of their
compasses, gimballed and with a flat face. Haven't tried with a direction-
finder, but it looks like it ought to work well. Big thing, probably
approved to be used on much bigger ships that ours...

http://www.weilbach.dk/netbutik.asp?...fold4479&l=155

-H

Thanks for the link!
Sorry for the oversight: The boat is in Seattle, USA.
Those compasses look excellent, but they're very expensive. Maybe I
shouldn't have any illusions about getting a good compass for little
money, but I hope I can find a commercial ship outfitter that carries
a decent product at non-yacht prices.

-m

Try this carefully crafted google search
http://www.google.com/search?q=marine+%22grid+compass

Unfortunately I have yet to see one in decent condition at a good enough
price. If you have around $100 you *might* get lucky with a used one

Ships will all be using gyrocompasses or fluxgates now. Your only
chance of beating yachtie pricing would be if you know a shipbreakers
who are currently scrapping an old fishing fleet.

--
Ian Malcolm. London, ENGLAND. (NEWSGROUP REPLY PREFERRED)
ianm[at]the[dash]malcolms[dot]freeserve[dot]co[dot]uk
[at]=@, [dash]=- & [dot]=. *Warning* HTML & 32K emails -- NUL:

On Dec 3, 2:38*pm, IanM wrote:
max camirand wrote:
On Dec 3, 1:54 pm, Heikki wrote:
max camirand wrote:
I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder.
You don't say where in the world you are. Here in Denmark, my first choice
would be Weilbach in Copenhagen - they've been in the business of compasses,
charts, etc since 1755 or so. I have sailed on a ship that has one of their
compasses, gimballed and with a flat face. Haven't tried with a direction-
finder, but it looks like it ought to work well. Big thing, probably
approved to be used on much bigger ships that ours...

http://www.weilbach.dk/netbutik.asp?...fold4479&l=155

-H

Thanks for the link!
Sorry for the oversight: The boat is in Seattle, USA.
Those compasses look excellent, but they're very expensive. Maybe I
shouldn't have any illusions about getting a good compass for little
money, but I hope I can find a commercial ship outfitter that carries
a decent product at non-yacht prices.

-m

Try this carefully crafted google search
http://www.google.com/search?q=marine+%22grid+compass

Unfortunately I have yet to see one in decent condition at a good enough
price. *If you have around $100 you *might* get lucky with a used one

Ships will all be using gyrocompasses or fluxgates now. *Your only
chance of beating yachtie pricing would be if you know a shipbreakers
who are currently scrapping an old fishing fleet.

--
Ian Malcolm. * London, ENGLAND. *(NEWSGROUP REPLY PREFERRED)
ianm[at]the[dash]malcolms[dot]freeserve[dot]co[dot]uk
[at]=@, [dash]=- & [dot]=. *Warning* HTML & 32K emails -- NUL:

Ah-ha, I didn't know they were called grid compasses. Large ships are
still built with magnetic compasses, even today (source: I am a
merchant marine officer). We don't ever /use/ them, but they're there,
on the monkey bridge, viewable from below at the wheel. As you
mentioned, all merchant ships are now primarily using gyrocompasses.

Good idea about looking for old fishing vessels. They're likely to
have something.

My other option is to get a "regular" compass and then whittle up a
direction finder on a fixed card in order to get a relative bearing
and mathematically apply it to the boat's compass heading and get the
compass bearing that way. Or maybe I'm just dumb for wanting to
navigate without electronic aids.

-m

Max,
This compass issue is real and it is expensive. Here are your choices. magnetic and true. Magnetic compasses deliver a magnetic
bearing referenced to magnetic north. They come in 2 flavors normal and flux gate. Both are influenced by external magnetic fields
even undersea cables, which can be really exciting when sailing on auto pilot. Of the two, the flux gate is the most reliable on a
steel boat, as you mount the sender high up on the mast away from local influences and in your case, is the best bang for your
buck. These are NOT primary ship compasses. This technology is yacht or workboat. All magnetic compasses must be swung at
installation and reswung every year. These can be found used, but if you buy used, plan on sending the unit to a compass house for
servicing and certification. They will need it, especially if you buy from an Indian ship breaker's yard. Gimbaled, flat faced
compasses are available used, but are rare and they are expensive $500-1k. Most cannot be used to take visual bearings. Hand helds
are you best bet there.

True bearing compasses come in two flavors gyro and now, satellite. Ships under 500 tons require at least one gyro and a
satellite compass as secondary under IMO rules. Ships over 500 tons require two gyro compasses. Gyro systems cost $20k new and the
gyrospheres need replacing every 5 or so years at $8-10K each. Satellite compasses operate using phase comparison of the carrier
signal and are very accurate, if installed correctly on the centerline. Both deliver a true bearing. Gyro compasses lose accuracy
above and below the 80th parallel and suffer speed distortion. Satellite compasses cost between $5k and $8k, run on low power,
very reliable, but will lose its bearing under severe storm conditions, however the good commercial ones have internal fluxgates
and inertial sensing chips that perform automatic dead reckoning under signal loss conditions. Used gyros are a bad deal because
most will have duff gyrospheres, use lots of power and are expensive to service. Used sat compasses are non-existent. The cheapest
new is Furuno, but they won't dead reckon. They have two models, one more accurate than the other. Both affordable. All true
compasses also require repeaters, some are stepper driven, some are differential and others are NMEA 0183. Rotating repeaters have
a max ROT rating. If you have a small boat that can turn quickly, their ROT rating can easily be exceeded. Older stepper repeaters
are typically rated around 6 degrees per second and the newer NMEA ones are around 20 degrees per second and electrical resync
buttons The older ones are mechanically reset. The rotary NMEA repeaters are $2500 each new and very very rare used.

I have a CPlath gyro, a Sperry Marine sat compass, a B&G Flux Gate on the mast and a failsafe CPlath magnetic. I have done it all
and own the T shirt. Bought everything second hand and rebuilt them, except for the Sat compass. I bought that new.
Steve


"max camirand" wrote in message ...
Hi group,

I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder. All of the compasses I've found online
have a hemispherical glass face, which makes them useless for taking a
bearing. I also strongly suspect that hand-held bearing compasses are
useless on a steel boat such as mine.

The only flat-faced gimballed compasses I've found are desk
decorations.

I'm looking for something similar to a real ship's compass, without
the giant compensating balls & bar (I will compensate it with
magnets). Anyone know where they can be bought?

Regards,
-Maxime Camirand

In article b4a50597-29a2-419f-b9fa-
,
says...

On Dec 3, 2:38*pm, IanM wrote:
max camirand wrote:
On Dec 3, 1:54 pm, Heikki wrote:
max camirand wrote:
I'm looking for a real gimballed marine compass, with a flat face
usable with a direction-finder.
You don't say where in the world you are. Here in Denmark, my first choice
would be Weilbach in Copenhagen - they've been in the business of compasses,
charts, etc since 1755 or so. I have sailed on a ship that has one of their
compasses, gimballed and with a flat face. Haven't tried with a direction-
finder, but it looks like it ought to work well. Big thing, probably
approved to be used on much bigger ships that ours...

http://www.weilbach.dk/netbutik.asp?...fold4479&l=155

-H

Thanks for the link!
Sorry for the oversight: The boat is in Seattle, USA.
Those compasses look excellent, but they're very expensive. Maybe I
shouldn't have any illusions about getting a good compass for little
money, but I hope I can find a commercial ship outfitter that carries
a decent product at non-yacht prices.

-m

Try this carefully crafted google search
http://www.google.com/search?q=marine+%22grid+compass

Unfortunately I have yet to see one in decent condition at a good enough
price. *If you have around $100 you *might* get lucky with a used one

Ships will all be using gyrocompasses or fluxgates now. *Your only
chance of beating yachtie pricing would be if you know a shipbreakers
who are currently scrapping an old fishing fleet.

--
Ian Malcolm. * London, ENGLAND. *(NEWSGROUP REPLY PREFERRED)
ianm[at]the[dash]malcolms[dot]freeserve[dot]co[dot]uk
[at]=@, [dash]=- & [dot]=. *Warning* HTML & 32K emails -- NUL:

Ah-ha, I didn't know they were called grid compasses. Large ships are
still built with magnetic compasses, even today (source: I am a
merchant marine officer). We don't ever /use/ them, but they're there,
on the monkey bridge, viewable from below at the wheel. As you
mentioned, all merchant ships are now primarily using gyrocompasses.

Good idea about looking for old fishing vessels. They're likely to
have something.

My other option is to get a "regular" compass and then whittle up a
direction finder on a fixed card in order to get a relative bearing
and mathematically apply it to the boat's compass heading and get the
compass bearing that way. Or maybe I'm just dumb for wanting to
navigate without electronic aids.

-m

Not dumb at all. It is a skill, you desire to get better at it. It all
just depends on how far you want to go with your sport

On Dec 3, 4:13*pm, "Steve Lusardi" wrote:
Max,
This compass issue is real and it is expensive. Here are your choices. magnetic and true. Magnetic compasses deliver a magnetic
bearing referenced to magnetic north. They come in 2 flavors normal and flux gate. Both are influenced by external magnetic fields
even undersea cables, which can be really exciting when sailing on auto pilot. Of the two, the flux gate is the most reliable on a
steel boat, as you mount the sender high up on the mast away from local influences and in your case, is the best bang for your
buck. These are NOT primary ship compasses. This technology is yacht or workboat. All magnetic compasses must be swung at
installation and reswung every year. These can be found used, but if you buy used, plan on sending the unit to a compass house for
servicing and certification. They will need it, especially if you buy from an Indian ship breaker's yard. Gimbaled, flat faced
compasses are available used, but are rare and they are expensive $500-1k.. Most cannot be used to take visual bearings. Hand helds
are you best bet there.

True bearing compasses come in two flavors gyro and now, satellite. Ships under 500 tons require at least one gyro *and a
satellite compass as secondary under IMO rules. Ships over 500 tons require two gyro compasses. Gyro systems cost $20k new and the
gyrospheres need replacing every 5 or so years at $8-10K each. Satellite compasses operate using phase comparison of the carrier
signal and are very accurate, if installed correctly on the centerline. Both deliver a true bearing. Gyro compasses lose accuracy
above and below the 80th parallel and suffer speed distortion. Satellite compasses cost between $5k and $8k, run on low power,
very reliable, but will lose its bearing under severe storm conditions, however the good commercial ones have internal fluxgates
and inertial sensing chips that perform automatic dead reckoning under signal loss conditions. Used gyros are a bad deal because
most will have duff gyrospheres, use lots of power and are expensive to service. Used sat compasses are non-existent. The cheapest
new is Furuno, but they won't dead reckon. They have two models, one more accurate than the other. Both affordable. All true
compasses also require repeaters, some are stepper driven, some are differential and others are NMEA 0183. Rotating repeaters have
a max ROT rating. If you have a small boat that can turn quickly, their ROT rating can easily be exceeded. Older stepper repeaters
are typically rated around 6 degrees per second and the newer NMEA ones are around 20 degrees per second and electrical resync
buttons The older ones are mechanically reset. The rotary NMEA repeaters are $2500 each new and very very rare used.

I have a CPlath gyro, a Sperry Marine sat compass, a B&G Flux Gate on the mast and a failsafe CPlath magnetic. I have done it all
and own the T shirt. Bought everything second hand and rebuilt them, except for the Sat compass. I bought that new.
Steve

I'm trying to minimize expense and electricity consumption, so I can't
have any sort of compass that puts a constant drain on the batteries,
as superior as a fluxgate compass may be. Swinging a magnetic compass
isn't a problem.

In your experience, have you found handheld compasses to be reliable
for taking bearings from a steel boat? I absolutely need magnetic
bearings for navigation. My first thought was a flat-faced compass
with a direction finder, like the ones we use on ships. The compass
will be mounted on a steering pedestal and therefore is fairly far
away from the nearest part of the steel hull and deck. The other two
options are a handheld bearing compass or a relative bearing direction
finder on a fixed card (add relative bearing to compass heading to get
compass bearing).

I probably should have asked at the same time... I'm also looking for
a rotator log.

-m

On Dec 3, 4:42*pm, I am Tosk wrote:

Not dumb at all. It is a skill, you desire to get better at it. It all
just depends on how far you want to go with your sport

I'll keep a handheld GPS onboard in case I get hopelessly lost in an
emergency situation

Otherwise, I'm limiting myself to:
lead line
rotator log
compass
sextant
timepiece
binoculars

I'm a merchant marine officer, so I studied navigation professionally
(both the "old" and "new" ways), and GPS has made the job a boring
button-pushing nightmare. I'd like to get away from that on my yacht.
I have no illusions about "going back to nature" or any garbage like
that. Slocum didn't have an accurate timepiece, while I will have one,
and the Polynesians only had some cleverly marked sticks. It's just
that I love navigation and I feel GPS takes all of the magic away from
making landfall. Going back to the methods of the 1800s will at least
involve some level of skill.

Too bad it's more expensive to do things the traditional way.

max camirand wrote:
On Dec 3, 4:42 pm, I am Tosk wrote:

Not dumb at all. It is a skill, you desire to get better at it. It all
just depends on how far you want to go with your sport

I'll keep a handheld GPS onboard in case I get hopelessly lost in an
emergency situation

Otherwise, I'm limiting myself to:
lead line
rotator log
compass
sextant
timepiece
binoculars

I'm a merchant marine officer, so I studied navigation professionally
(both the "old" and "new" ways), and GPS has made the job a boring
button-pushing nightmare. I'd like to get away from that on my yacht.
I have no illusions about "going back to nature" or any garbage like
that. Slocum didn't have an accurate timepiece, while I will have one,
and the Polynesians only had some cleverly marked sticks. It's just
that I love navigation and I feel GPS takes all of the magic away from
making landfall. Going back to the methods of the 1800s will at least
involve some level of skill.

Too bad it's more expensive to do things the traditional way.

I have nothing against doing "real" navigation. That and the paper
charts still work after a lighting strike. (The story is good, plan on
buying at least three rounds of beer if you want to hear it all.)

Prowl the chandlers and set traps on E-bay. You might get lucky. We
that are old enough to use that stuff are dying off fast and the kids
don't want it.

Might I suggest that you get a decent box compass. They are all flat
top, but that doesn't matter. Also get a pair of binoculars with a
bearing compass in them.

A Sextant is neat, mine is Bendix Mark2. Been in the family since
WWII. I Dread to think what any decent device would cost if you could
find it. A friend has a more modern one with a half silvered front
mirror. I just can't make it pull down right. Maybe if I was used to it.

If you want a mechanical chronometer, good luck, they are collectors
items. A good modern wrist watch will work as well if it is kept at a
more or less constant temperature. You rate it - just like always.

Are going to do any long passages off soundings? Because, a taffrail
log is a serious PITA and when you see the shark that snatches the
spinner, you can kiss that one good-by.

Lead lines are an another amazing PITA. Pretty much useless if you are
single handing. Lots of them around and often for the price of the lead.

I wish you fair wind and smooth sea.

Matt Colie - Lifelong Waterman, Licensed Mariner (also- 40++ years) and
Perpetual Sailor.