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Subject: Re: About Lunars, part 3
From: Chuck Griffiths (griffiths_chuck@XXX.XXX)
Date: Fri Feb 15 2002 - 16:44:49 EST
While I was waiting for the Moon to reappear in the evening sky to play around
with lunar distances I've been measuring interstellar distances (as is often put
forward as a method to check one's sextant for accuracy) for practice. This has
raised a couple of questions in my mind. First, the easiest way to deal with
refraction when measuring interstellar distances is to use two stars at equal
altitudes and not correct for refraction, would this be such a special case when
measuring lunar distances that we should forget this as a possibility? Second,
does choosing good moon star or moon planet combinations require that we give
some thought to the location of the other body relative to the path of the moon?
I'm thinking that the optimum second body would be exactly in the path of the
moon's track though the sky. I also imagine that if the second body chosen were
"abeam" the moon as it passed, the measured lunar distance would change less
with time than if the second body were more or less ahead or behind the moon's
position but in it's path.
Chuck Griffiths
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