This truly unique book enables anyone to solve the basic triangle of navigation by drawing it, literally without the use of any numbers except those on the protractor. It reduces the intricate spherical figures of celestial navigation to simple and familiar flat triangles. Yet this system is mathematically sound – it is based on the most exact geometry of the navigation triangle and can be used for actual navigation at sea or in the air.
Primarily however the book is intended as a learning aid – for the general reader who has always wondered how navigators „sail by the stars,” and also for the veteran mariner who has been using the formulas and tables of navigation for years without understanding their underlying function. High-ranking Navy officers have endorsed this book, and the theory behind it has been published in the Navy's professional journal, U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings.
A series of two-color diagrams shows how the spherical triangle formed by ship,… (tovább)
This truly unique book enables anyone to solve the basic triangle of navigation by drawing it, literally without the use of any numbers except those on the protractor. It reduces the intricate spherical figures of celestial navigation to simple and familiar flat triangles. Yet this system is mathematically sound – it is based on the most exact geometry of the navigation triangle and can be used for actual navigation at sea or in the air.
Primarily however the book is intended as a learning aid – for the general reader who has always wondered how navigators „sail by the stars,” and also for the veteran mariner who has been using the formulas and tables of navigation for years without understanding their underlying function. High-ranking Navy officers have endorsed this book, and the theory behind it has been published in the Navy's professional journal, U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings.
A series of two-color diagrams shows how the spherical triangle formed by ship, pole, and star can become a pyramid, with all curves eliminated. Imaginary hinges are applied to the pyramid and it, in turn, unfolds into a group of four simple flat triangles.
In this form, the no-longer-spherical triangle of navigation can be drawn and measured on any flat surface, with an ordinary ruler and protractor. This solution by construction is so fascinating that it leads painlessly into mathematics. And so Part Two of the book presents „Navigation with Numbers,” which proceeds from an elementary tree-measuring experiment to the derivation of the mysterious cosine formula.
Part Three shows how the principles of navigation are put to actual use in modern practice, at sea or in the air.
Model diagram sheets are included, for use in working out the examples offered in the text and for guidance in applying Navigation without Numbers to practical problems.
