[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > One question I have had but never ask. If Uncle Sam was messing with GPS > did he also mess with Loran? My Flybuddy is never on. It is good for getting > within sight. I know all the tec differences. And I know GPS is better. But > for my flying the Loran is good enough. And it came with the Alon so I will > keep it for now. Any answers? > Warren H.
Loran was an old legacy system left over from the good old days. Ships and airliners could use it with a trained navigator, a hundred pound receiver, and some minutes to compute the plotted position. When microprocessors got good enough, WE got the ability to use them in little boats and planes. The main thing they added to loran for our mode-c use was the Rocky Mountain chain. Perhaps the cost of one or two of the GPS satellites (which have to be replaced every once in a while). Accuracy of loran is never as good as with GPS even when "selective" whatever is turned off and nowhere as good as full accuracy GPS. The Department of Defense developed GPS. It was probably an afterthought for them to let us use it at all. Perhaps they needed our support to get the (not small) funding through congress. GPS was developed to be a world-wide system. It can be hard to get the enemy to support your establishing three or four loran stations near their homes to improve your tank, artillery and aircraft shelling and bombing accuracy (among other things). Yep, loran is really good enough for my flying. But it is adversely affected by thunderstorms. And, the FEDS have made noises about dropping maintenance for it in fairly near future, now that GPS is so widely adopted. I've had the long wire antenna removed from my Coupe and the old loran is in a box in the store room. My $99 Magellan GPS is fully self contained, does everything that the loran did and I can put it in my shirt pocket for hiking or a cup holder in my car. Always have loved those techno-toys. -- Ed Burkhead Peoria, Ill. Ercoupe N3802H, 415-D Never open an attachment with a ".exe" or ".com" or ".vbm" suffix. To be safe, turn off Microsoft's Visual Basic Macro execution option. Consider not using Outlook for mail - lots of viruses target its security flaws. __________________________________________________________________________ ______ To unsubscribe from this list please send mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ___________________________________________________________ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
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