Next message: Peter Fogg: "A Lunar alternative?"
On Wednesday, October 1, 2003, at 01:02 PM, Noyce, Bill wrote:
> Cleaning out old mail, ran across this from Dan Allen just over a year
> ago:
>
>> My own
>> kit of equipment has a very reliable calculator (an HP-48G+) but also
>> has the most important formulas printed out and a slide rule in case I
>> need to do it by hand. This gives me both self-reliance and ease of
>> use with a non-electronic backup.
>>
>> Dan
>
> I'm curious, Dan, what you use the slide rule for? I don't think
> it's useful for sight reduction via Law of Cosines or similar
> formulas, because you can't get enough precision. It *would* be
> useful to speed up interpolation in tables, or for time & distance
> or wind/drift/course problems.
> -- Bill
You have a good point. So far I mainly use the slide rule for fun,
just messing around. The precision would be okay for lifeboat
navigation I think, but I have never really had to rely upon it.
Dan
