HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: whoward@lamont.ldgo.columbia.edu (Will Howard)
Subject: Re: Celestial vs. GPS (was Re: Bermuda Trip - 7/'93)
Organization: Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 14:40:31 GMT

In article <1gqlkcINN9e7@calvin.NYU.EDU> roy@mchip00.med.nyu.edu (Roy Smith)
writes:
>whoward@lamont.ldgo.columbia.edu (Will Howard) writes:
>>If you want to guesstimate latitude (at night inthe Northern Hemisphere),
hold
>>out your arm straight and make a fist. Close one eye, and count the number of
>>fists from the horizon to the North Star (Polaris). Each fist is roughly ten
>>degrees of arc, so multiply by ten, and that's your latitude. 
>
>	Ok, I just tried it.  Sitting in my desk chair sighting the other
>side of the lab (about 41 feet), my fist subtends from the floor to between
>the first and second bookshelves, about 66 inches (5.5 feet) or so.
>Depending on how I squint, hold my head, etc, I can get about +/- 4 inches
>on that; atan(5.5/41) is about 7.6 degrees.  Maybe my arm is too long, or my
>fist too small (or my head too big, it's possible).

Maybe your retina's too big. :-)

>	Let's try a group experiment, all you rec.boats boys and girls.  If
>you'll try the same experiment and send me the data, I'll tabulate the
>results and report back (Hey, like, I'm supposed to be a scientist, right?
>At least that's what my ID card says.  Maybe if being a scientist doesn't
>work out, I'll try being a lemon merchant)
>
 
I have tried this and it works. Of course you could just calibrate your own
fist-eye arc. Remember this isn't meant to be a precision navigational
technique, just a rough-and-ready worst-case-scenario trick.

Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: whoward@lamont.ldgo.columbia.edu (Will Howard)
Subject: Re: Loran vs SatNav (Was Bermuda...)
Organization: Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1992 15:36:19 GMT

In article <1992Dec14.112836.25447@zoo.bt.co.uk> jcs@zoo.bt.co.uk (John C
Sager) writes:
>In article <1992Dec11.094834.25113@lut.ac.uk>, O.B.Schou@lut.ac.uk writes:
>
>
>> 
>> Forgive me if I am wrong, but is not GPS a military system, where some
>> of the "details" are still secret (encoded), and the miltay reserve the
>> right AT ANY TIME to degrade or even remove the info for non military
>> use?  If so, would it not be safer to have a backup method, even if
>> just DR and EP (plus occasional sextant use)?
>
>
>GPS is not yet fully deployed and there have been cases where the service has
>been unavailable or available on a restricted basis for a short period (some
>hours). It is apparently the intent of the Department of Defense to make
>it available all the time to civilian users once it is fully deployed.
>I don't yet know if a date has been fixed for that.
>
>On the original point, Loran vs GPS, my impression is that GPS scores on
>worldwide availability and accuracy of absolute fix. Loran scores on cost
>(at the moment. GPS should be down to Loran costs soon), and on fix
>repeatability. By this I mean that, if you navigate to a point & note its
>co-ords, or set a waypoint there, you can more accurately return to that
>point in future using Loran than you can using GPS. This is purely because
>of the Selective Availability (SA) errors intoduced onto GPS fixes by the DoD.
>If SA were turned off or negated by using differential GPS, then GPS would
>be better than Loran at this as well. GPS also allows height fixes
>(not much use on a boat but great for aircraft & land navigation).
>
Even with the signal degraded by the military, GPS accuracy and precision (what
SA really affects - thus the "repeatability" of Loran fixes) are very good. But
GPS fixes do vary in reliability, in part because at any given time and place,
the number of satellites "visible" to the receiver (the "constellation") and
their altitudes can vary. Just as in celestial nav., the more stars in the fix,
the better, and the more angular separation at optimal altitudes among them,
the better. On oceanographic cruises in the mid-'80's we still did not have
global, 24-hour GPS coverage, and if we wanted to run survey tracks under GPS
coverage we had to wait for a "window." There are now, I believe, enough
satellites up for 24 hour global coverage with at least two satellites.
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: letmein@next11csc.wam.umd.edu (Rich Samuel Biscoe)
Subject: Question: How to do a three-part rope splice
Organization: Workstations at Maryland, University of Maryland, College Park
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 02:50:58 GMT

Excuse the ignorance...

	But I call upon the vast knowledge of thjis group to answer,  
actually, two questions..

	1) What are the steps involved in a three-part rope splice

	

	2) If someone had a young ambition to be Captain of the highest
	   class of vessel(cruiseship, tanker,etc.)  What would be the
	   chain of events to lead into such a position???


Any help would be much appreciated, Thanx!!!!

- Rich
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: scott@bell.b17a.ingr.com (Scott Bell)
Subject: Re: Alpha I Stern Drive Question
Keywords: Maintenance problems curiosities Mercruiser
Organization: Intergraph
Date: Tue, 15 Dec 1992 13:47:50 GMT

In article <1992Dec14.165012.27113@tc.fluke.COM>, bmyers@tc.fluke.COM (Bob Myers)
writes:
|> 
|> Has anybody seen this before?

    Unfortunately, yes.
|> 
|> The Corbett II is powered by a 260 HP Mercruiser Alpha One stern
|> drive.  It's a 1990 model with 91 hours.
|> 
|> When warming it up yesterday, I noticed something unusual.  Shortly after 
|> starting, while idling, some of the bubbles 
|> churned by by the exhaust contained some sort of oil or gas.  As
|> they burst they created tiny sheens on the water.
|> 
   << description of engine operation while cold deleted.. >>
 
|> Last time I ran the boat at speed, there were no problems.  Running the drive
|> at the dock in forward or reverse causes no unusual sights nor sounds.
|> 
|> My speculation is that the bubbles are caused buy either miscellaneous engine
|> oil being blown through the exhaust when the engine is cold (and hasn't been 
|> run for a week or more) and/or gas from the rich mixture at cold start.
|> 
|> Anybody have any thoughts on this curiosity?

    My Evinrude OB does the same thing, and I haven't been able to fix this 
    either. It always happens when the engine is first started and/or cold,
    like you described. This is basically because the engine is fuel rich upon
    first starting, which has too much oil/gas to initially burn it all up. Also
    when the engine warms up, the piston rigns 'hug' the cylinder wall better.
    This probably doesn't cause the oil/fuel blow-by, though.

    If you let your engine sit awhile it will probably do the same thing, even
    when warm. This is because some of the oil may still be in the exhaust 
    manifold/outlet, and not burned off. I wonder if VRO's do this?

    Any thoughts?
|> 
|> Thanks in advance.
|> --  
|> "When I am inaccurate, I am definitively inaccurate."
|> 
|> Bob Myers
|> bmyers@tc.fluke.COM

Scott
_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
| Scott Bell                               |" Walkin' down the street you | 
| Intergraph Corp. - Mapping Sciences Div. |  can hear the sound, there's | 
| M/S IW17A2  Huntsville, AL  35894-0001   |  some bad honky-tonkers and  | 
| scott@bell.b17a.ingr.com   (Internet)    |  they're layin' it down. "   | 
| 205-730-1776   #include <std_disclaim.h> |        SRV, 'In Step'        | 
_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: jfh@cs.brown.edu (John F. Hughes)
Subject: Re: Celestial vs. GPS (was Re: Bermuda Trip - 7/'93)
Organization: Brown University Department of Computer Science
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 16:18:50 GMT

In article <1go434INNcsp@calvin.NYU.EDU> roy@mchip00.med.nyu.edu (Roy Smith) writes:
>briang@atlastele.com (Brian Godfrey) writes:
>
> [how to hack up a sextant-like device]
> [how to hack up HO249 ...]
>
>the ocean) work out sine and cosine tables (you do remember the formulas,
>don't you?  I think it's sin(x) = x + x^3/3! + x^5/5! + ...; if it's not
>that, it's something like that, and given enough time I'm sure I could work
>it out by trial and error).  Obviously, you don't need to work anything out
>to the 0.1 minute accuracy HO-249 uses.  

[Hacking up a Nautical Almanac: ]
>	What if you lost your Nautical Almanac?  Well, if you just had an
>analema (maybe have one tatoo'ed onto your thigh before you leave on an
>ocean trip? :-)) you would have a reasonable table of sun's declination vs.
>time of year.  Probably more than accurate enough to let you follow a
>lattitude line (parallel sailing, just like Columbus did) until you hit
>land.


This brings up a topic that's interested me for a while, namely, minimalist
navigation. 

For example, the correction for height of eye is the following:

correction in minutes = -sqrt(heigh of eye in feet)


And a cheap approximation for the refraction correction is the following:

R (in minutes) = ((90 - sextant angle) / 48) ^ 3


But there are other things that I'd like to be able to work out too. 
I figure that if you know a few basic facts (the declination and SHA of your
favorite stars, for example, as of some year, and the first few terms of 
the Taylor series for the corrections to these), plus the date and time,
you should be able to work out a lot of the things you need for ordinary
navigation in latitudes 50S to 50N or so. Has anyone else played with this
sort of stuff? 

Any useful formulas?

-John
From: david_s@iastate.edu (David P Sly)
Newsgroups: rec.boats
Subject: Mark Twain Boats
Date: 20 Dec 92 17:49:51 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA

I have a Mark Twain 18' open bow 1978 runabout.  It is in practially mint
condition, and I would like to get some information on the company that
made it.  I know that they were in st Louis but went out of business, but
that is about all I can find.  Does anyone know anything more?
From: karina@eniac.seas.upenn.edu (Karina Haavik)
Newsgroups: rec.boats
Subject: Re: Coast Guard Boardings and TQM
Date: 18 Dec 92 20:41:43 GMT

In article <8017@tekig7.PEN.TEK.COM> alany@tekig5.pen.tek.com 
(Alan Yelvington) writes:

>I am going to recommend that the boarding officer
>present the skipper with a business card.  That card
>should have the boarding officer's name, assigned cutter,
>and a toll-free number or address where comments concerning
>the boarding can be referred. 
>
>My intent is to promote customer service and tear down
>some of the corporate annonimity that the Coast Guard
>has.

Bravo!  That sounds like a wonderfully constructive suggestion.  I have never
been boarded by the CG, since I have a small boat and sail on a river.  But
I think we have here the classic conflict between law enforcement wanting
nearly limitless power to accomplish the goals the government has given them,
and on the other hand citizens feeling harrassed by the exercise of that power.

My personal solution:  If you feel threatened enough to need to board my car, 
boat, etc. at gunpoint, I can't stop you and I won't be stupid enough to try.
I recognize that there are people out there with Uzis and they make the cops
nervous...  But once you've finished your search and determined that I am a
law-abiding citizen, everything should be back in its place, the officer
should be polite and thank me for my hospitality, even though we both know he 
took it.  :-)

And I've never heard of the CG using dogs.  If they don't, they should.  They
should do whatever they can to make a quick determination.  To my mind 20 
minutes is a spot check, a few hours is piracy.  Dealing with seasick dogs is
their problem. 

Sticking my neck out...

Karina

--
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Karina Haavik   ******  karina@seas.upenn.edu  ***  Comet #2970
It looks like a boat.   It leaks like a boat.       It must be a boat.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: roy@mchip00.med.nyu.edu (Roy Smith)
Newsgroups: rec.boats
Subject: Re: Celestial vs. GPS (was Re: Bermuda Trip - 7/'93)
Date: 17 Dec 1992 19:49:32 GMT
Organization: New York University, School of Medicine
NNTP-Posting-Host: mchip00.med.nyu.edu

whoward@lamont.ldgo.columbia.edu (Will Howard) writes:
>If you want to guesstimate latitude (at night inthe Northern Hemisphere), hold
>out your arm straight and make a fist. Close one eye, and count the number of
>fists from the horizon to the North Star (Polaris). Each fist is roughly ten
>degrees of arc, so multiply by ten, and that's your latitude. 

	Ok, I just tried it.  Sitting in my desk chair sighting the other
side of the lab (about 41 feet), my fist subtends from the floor to between
the first and second bookshelves, about 66 inches (5.5 feet) or so.
Depending on how I squint, hold my head, etc, I can get about +/- 4 inches
on that; atan(5.5/41) is about 7.6 degrees.  Maybe my arm is too long, or my
fist too small (or my head too big, it's possible).

	Let's try a group experiment, all you rec.boats boys and girls.  If
you'll try the same experiment and send me the data, I'll tabulate the
results and report back (Hey, like, I'm supposed to be a scientist, right?
At least that's what my ID card says.  Maybe if being a scientist doesn't
work out, I'll try being a lemon merchant)

	BTW, another good thing to remember is that the full moon or sun are
both pretty darn close to 30 minutes in diameter (half a degree).  Just in
case you want to calibrate that sextant-thingie you built out of assorted
junk you just happend to find laying around in the bottom of the liferaft.
Of course, unless you have some spare retnas laying around too, you might
want to stick to using the moon.
-- 
Roy Smith <roy@nyu.edu>
Hippocrates Project, Department of Microbiology, Coles 202
NYU School of Medicine, 550 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016
"This never happened to Bart Simpson."
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: timothy@tasman.cc.utas.edu.au (Timothy John Gale)
Subject: Re: Confused (was: Zincs on boats)
Organization: University of Tasmania, Australia.
Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1992 12:40:34 GMT

I dug out my old chemistry textbook and it has a really
good section on electrolysis.  Basically, it goes as follows...

	1. For a metal to corrode, it must release electrons.
	2. Anything that stops electrons being released from a metal will
	   stop it corroding.  The easiest way to stop electrons being released
	   is to "pump" electrons in, which can be done by connecting the metal
	   to be protected to a source of electrons.  Two common sources of
	   electrons are (i) an electricity supply and (ii) another metal.
	   When using another metal it is essential to use one that will
	   corrode preferentially and will therefore "spit out" electrons.
	3. You are in trouble when you have two metals in contact and you
	   want to preserve them both, since the one that corrodes 
	   preferentially will corrode faster than normal.  This is because 
	   it finds that getting rid of electrons is easier than normal as
	   they can pass straight to the other metal.
 
I'm sorry if this is a bit confusing, but my chemistry is a little rusty...

Tim Gale
Hobart
Tasmania
Australia
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: floydb@rpi.edu
Subject: Request for opinions: Cruising and fishing for food
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 21:31:56 GMT

I recently began wading through "ocean fishing" books available
in our local libraries. Unfortunately they are mostly about
sport fishing and not about eatable fishing. Any good bood 
suggestions?


Could those who have ocean cruising experience comment on the
possibility of catching the occasional fish while cruising?

Presuming you have a 30' plus boat, what are the advantages
and challenges of fishing under-sail?

It would seem that in mild weather you should be able to troll,
but in any weather you would not want to fly cast on a sail boat,
for example.

Landing a sizable fish could be a major problem on some boats.
Then again, smaller fish might be landed and would make a nice
meal.

There would always be the option of mooring the sailboat then
still-fishing or shore-casting, even if fishing under-sail
proves too much trouble.

Any thoughts, suggestions, opinions?

thanks

barry
From: truesdel@ics.uci.edu (Scott Truesdell)
Subject: Re: Gybing Centreboards
Newsgroups: rec.boats
Organization: ICS Department, U.C.I.
Date: 18 Dec 92 02:38:54 GMT
Followup-To: rec.boats

In article <28651@oasys.dt.navy.mil>, michaels@oasys.dt.navy.mil (Robert
Michaelson) wrote:
>
> Anyone know what happened to Hawkeye and Agressive? Are they still
> around?

I saw Hawkeye often when she was new. I never sailed on her but talked to
several people who raced on her. Number one problem was the mechanics of
raising and lowering those ballasted boards. If there was any load on them
at all from sailing the forces would bind the board(s) in the slot(s) and
nothing would go nowhere nohow. Thousands and thousands were spent on
various scemes to get the mechanism working reliably. How'd you like to try
to make it around a course with one board jammed 2/3 the way down and the
other board stuck 1/3 the way down? Forget it!

The other big problem was off the wind. No one could figure out what the
optimal board configuration was but they knew what it wasn't! I remember
tales of the Big Boat Series on S.F. Bay and them trying to run downwind in
27 knots breeze with both boards up. I think the battle call was, "Give me
fifty yards on either side! I'm coming through!"

I wouldn't be surprised if the boat were cut up for scrap and the fittings
and rigging reused elsewhere. I'm fuzzy on this (I went below on a lot of
custom boats in the 70's) but I recall Hawkeye represented the epitome of
the stripped out IOR monstor -- corroding, sweating aluminum, damp sail
bags, stifling ventilation.

  --scott

P.S. She WAS an awe inspiring sight, though! A dream come true for a
techo-weenie such as myself.
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: jayph@microsoft.com (Jay Phillips)
Subject: Chartering in the Grenadines
Date: 14 Dec 92 22:00:15 GMT
Organization: Microsoft Corp.
Keywords: charter Grenadines Moorings

We're planning a sail charter trip to the vicinity of the Grenadines around
November of '93.

We're planning on using the Moorings based on their reputation, but I've never
chartered from them before.

Questions:

- Is this a good time of the year to be in this area with respect to wind,
  weather, etc.?

- While I've chartered for many years in the Pacific NW, this will be my first
  trip to this part of the world.  Is this reasonable or would another spot
  in the Caribbean be more appropriate for a first visit?  We picked the
  Grenadines because it seemed, from our limited study, to be less 'touristy'
  than other areas.

- Given that, after reviewing answers to the above questions, we still make
  our trip as planned, are there any 'must see' places/events that we should
  include in our itinerary?

- Any other words of wisdom?

Thanks for sharing your experiences.

Jay Phillips
email: jayph@microsoft.com
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: wwalker@qualcomm.com (Bill Walker)
Subject: Re: Request for advice: Buy vs Crew
Followup-To: rec.boats
Organization: Qualcomm, Inc.
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 23:36:05 GMT

In article <b_k2s8f@rpi.edu>, floydb@rpi.edu wrote:
> 
> I have found the collective wisdom of this group most benefitial
> to my ever increasing thrust for boating knowledge, equalled only
> by a good dose of experience.

Me, too.

> 
> 
> Yet again I have a question for everyone who has done some ocean 
> cruising:

I haven't done any, but I can't resist giving you some answers based on my
reading.

> 
> If both options are equally obtainable (financially, etc.) what are
> the advantages/disadvantages of regularly crewing on other people's
> boats (30' plus, extended ocean cruising) vs owning a boat and going
> to and from more or less the same places?
> 
> What have others done presented with these options?
> 
> My situation may or may not include plans with one other person
> (my brother), to be determined; no major financial obstacles; no
> specific destinations in mind (other than most of the places that
> others seem to be going to); a strong desire to be on the water
> (extension of in-land experiences); no major intellectual/common-sense
> obstacles; a strong desire to see most of the world, an extension
> of extensive air/land travels; no major time constraints; etc.

Nice work if you can get it, Floyd.  I'm envious of your situation.

[...]
> Socially, crewing would enable us to meet more people over a period
> of time on various boats and also experience how others handle their
> lives/boats (favoring crewing for some, owning for those less socially
> predisposed).

"Meeting more people" can be a significant problem with crewing for others.
 You could find yourself stuck on an extended voyage with a modern Captain
Queeg.  If you're the captain, you don't have to take orders from the crew.
 On the other hand, you're responsible for the lives of your crew, and of
course for the boat (and the bills).


----------
Bill Walker - WWalker@qualcomm.com - QUALCOMM, Inc., San Diego, CA
All opinions expressed are mine, and do not reflect those of my employer.
"First thing we do, we kill all the lawyers." - Shakespeare
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: L629159@LMSC5.IS.LMSC.LOCKHEED.COM
Subject: Re: Coast Guard Boating Tax, NOT!
Organization: Lockheed Missiles & Space Company, Inc.
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 00:32:34 GMT

      cworth@OAVAX.CSUCHICO.EDU (CHUCK WORTH)writes:

In article <7975@tekig7.PEN.TEK.COM>, alany@tekig5.pen.tek.com (Alan Yelvington)
>PLEASE!  No matter what you think, the
>Coast Guard is our friend.

HORSEPUCKY!  As long as the Coasties are conducting armed, warrantless
boardings and searches of US ships in US waters (under the pretext of
drug interdiction) they're no friends of mine.


**********************************************************
 Chuck Worth            California State University, Chico
 CWORTH@OAVAX.CSUCHICO.EDU

endquote.

At least, not until you need to be plucked from the water as happened
some years ago to a friend of mine, or are substantially overdue
somewhere, or have your boat stolen to be used to defeat drug interdiction,
or need Loran, or want to avoid icebergs in the North Atlantic or...

I hope you get my point.  Besides, they're SUPPOSED to be the revenue...

Al Moore
Newsgroups: rec.boats
From: kaygee@hardy.u.washington.edu (Kevin Giansante)
Subject: the talkline is now open
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 00:04:41 GMT

I am seeking information on the merits and drawbacks of S2 9.2
sailboats, both aft- and center-cockpit models.  My interest is
coastal cruising.  All opinions welcome; specific info greatly
appreciated.

Express yourself.

kaygee@u.washington.edu


Newsgroups: rec.boats