Listswainiana

One of my hobbies is Navigation: more specifically navigation over the oceans. Part of this hobby is an interest in ancient methods used and so I like to build accurate replicas of such tools as cross staffs, backstaffs, quadrants, Hadley sextants (or octants), chip logs, traverse boards and sandglasses.

I make them both for my own amusement and also to sell to the various tall ships.

The attached photo shows a chip log, traverse board, and 28 second sandglass I made for the USS Constitution. The wood used is mahogany. While that generally wasn't the wood of choice for these implements, this was a special case as the wood was taken from the vessel during her last refit. Also, a special case is the carving on the end plates of the chip log: the year of her launching and 2 stars signifying her 200th birthday. Normally these would not be included in a work-a-day type of tool.

This is a set similar to the one I made for Constitution. This set was sold to the Salem "Friendship": a replica of a 1797 merchant vessel.

Here there is a 28 second sandglass, a 14 second sandglass, a chip log and a traverse board. The sand glasses were used as timing intervals for measuring speed with the chip log. the traverse board was used to record course and speed each half hour of a four hour watch.

The materials used were oak and ash.

Here is a better view of a Traverse board. There are 2 sections: the compass rose and the speed recording area.

There are 8 concentric rings of holes over the compass rose: one ring for each 30 minute segment of a 4 hour watch. At the bottom are 8, 2 row groups of holes. The top row of each group of two is used to record knots; the second row is used to record fathoms or fractions of a knot.

During each half hour, they hove the log and measured the ships speed. If this is the first 30 minutes of a new watch, and if they measured a speed of 5 knots and 2 fathoms, they would place a peg in the fifth hole of the first row and a peg in the second hole of the second row: 5 knots, 2 fathoms. They would mark their heading and place a peg in the inner ring at the appropriate hole.

They repeated these operations each half hour of the 4 hour watch. Then the sailing master would take this data and use it to begin the dead reckoning portion of the position fix.

Submitted to The Gunroom by the mysterious FVillon, these poems are the pinnacle of suetical verse. The cycle consists of two acrostic sonnets and an acrostic ode. The title of the first sonnet is a quote of Patrick O'Brian's, the title of the second is by Jack Aubrey, the third - Stephen Maturin. It may now be revealed that the identity of FVillon is Lisa Grossman, co-author of Lobscouse & Spotted Dog, Junior Amiable Slut, and the Muse of Suet - the list's own Suetonius.