On Jul 27, 12:29?pm, John H. wrote:
On Fri, 27 Jul 2007 08:42:12 -0700, Chuck Gould

wrote:
I'm writing a short item this morning about hand held bearing
compasses.

I carry one on my boat, and could find it in an instant. I suspect,
however, that in this age of electro-nav gimmicks I'm now in the
minority.

Three questions:

1. Do you carry a bearing compass?

I have a compass mounted in the boat. I do not have a hand held.

The advantage of a hand held vs using the permanently mounted compass
is the ability to sight across the handheld and get a bearing on
charted buoy, beacon, point of land, etc. That's pretty hard to do
accurately with the permanent mount compass, and if you're off 15-20
degrees in the bearing you might as well almost not bother.

To be properly equipped, IMO, you should have both aboard. Unless you
are on a small or uncharted body of water like an inland lake or you
have intimate local knowledge.




2. Whether you carry one or not, do you know why anybody would want
to?

If their boat is sinking and they have to man a life raft, it could come in
handy. Or, if someone angrily smashed their laptop on the mounted compass,
a hand held could come in handy.


And.....if the electro-nav goes out and a boater can get a bearing on
at least two (three would be better) charted objects it then becomes
possible to draw some plot lines on the chart and determine where
you're at. :-)




3. Do you have any charts aboard, or are you running depending
strictly on an uninterrupted supply of DC power and counting on 100%
reliability from your electronics for navigation information?



Yes, charts are aboard for any area in which I may roam.


Good show! Welcome to the annual anachronist's convention, I'm sitting
in the next row back. :-)


--
John H