Hi
I've been meaning to practice using a watch as a compass or direction finder.
I'm sure we covered this in the Boy Scouts but that was long ago.
I've noticed the Alpinist and similar watches with internal bezels and some with external bezels are recommended for this.
My Citizen Chronograph has no movable bezel. It occurred to me that one might instead allow the stop watch second hand to advance to the desired angle using it as a pointer would work as well if not better.

Anyone here tried this?
Are there any publications, military or otherwise, I might find online that deal with using watches, especially chronographs, for land navigation?

 

Hi Prof. I don’t know how to find the link but I had a thread during the winter months and it showed a bit of detail on your query. Best wishes!

 

Well I tried an Alpinist, read the manual for the Alpinist, tried again and TBH sold it.

In post lock-down Britain I'm never in a situation where I can't look for a bright spot in the cloudy sky, register the time of day and decide that south is "thataway"!!

When I'm not using my android item as a communications device I understand that I can use an app called "A compass".

I think that google will be your friend. I recall something from the Scouts which involved standing a match on a watch crystal and using the resultant shadow to er, tell the time? Oh its a long time ago.

Listen, I hope you have a lot of fun doing your research and I wish you every success in identifying north etc.

 

Found the thread by using google.
https://omegaforums.net/threads/the-case-for-climate-change-oliver-cromwell’s-watch-using-a-watch-as-a-compass-and-more.108646/

 

I'm still struggling on understanding the 3 hands on a time-only watch so this chronograph-compass stuff is way over my head.

 

These Navigators make it a little easier. Just hold the watch flat, point the hour hand at the sun, and the N hand points north. As long as you don’t have your AM and PM mixed up... and you’re not in the Southern Hemisphere...

 

It’s simple. To use your watch as an approximate compass (outside of the tropics in the northern hemisphere), hold the watch horizontal and point the hour hand at the sun. Half way between the hour hand and the twelve o'clock is south. This works even during Daylight Savings Time.

 

Wow thanks for posting and I never seen that vintage navigator before. Seems Gallet really put out some interesting variations.

 

Interesting way to use a watch.

Although, nowadays, many of us carry a smartphone and there's an app that comes with it for an accurate compass.
.

.