Where Have All The Chronometers Gone?

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Small time errors such as we have been discussing are not sufficient to cause one to miss Hawaii... by a long shot.

Your apocryphal story seems related to poor practice, not poor timekeeping, so I'll continue to "poo poo" the importance of hyper-accurate timepieces for small boat navigation.

Jim

Ed Zackery... on the equator 1 hour = 15 degrees of longitude..... 4 minutes of time = 1 degree of longitude.... 1 minute of time = 15' of longitude or 15 miles.

At the equator the error in longitude is at its maximum... for 1 minute of time it varies as the cosine from 15 miles at the equator to zero at the poles.