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Doug,
Thank you for your interesting information
on Tamaya sextants. Unfortunately, their web site
is only in Japanese (so probably they do not care much about
their overseas sales currently).
On Thu, 14 Oct 2004, Royer, Doug wrote:
> I purchaced mine directly from the plant in Osaka in
> the mid-late 70's.It
> was a small operation (relatively) then
Interesting. Bruce Bauer says in his Sextant Handbook that
"Tamaya, which is related to the Asahi Pentax camera company
is believed to be the largest maker of sextants. This is the estimate
of one of the major US importers based on sales -
actual figures of production are trade secrets"
He also says:
"That source also gave me the idea of the size and trend
of the US market. In the later 70-s when the sextant
market was most
active, about 2000 instruments a year were imported and sold.
In 1984, the sales were down by half".
In view of this, Bill's statement about thousands NOW
is somewhat unexpected.
Alex.
