Colin the Mathmo

Friday was the equinox, at 14:46 GMT. I didn't get the time, but yesterday, March 21st, I went out to measure our latitude.

I did so on the surrounds of the Port Sunlight Analemmatic Sundial, which seemed appropriate:

https://sundialsoc.org.uk/wp_bridol/pages/S7/S7998.html

I'll write up the technique and do the error analysis later, but with a stick, and director's chair, about 10 pennies, a length of ball chain, and a tape measure, I got a latitude of:

53.343891584 degrees.

Check the page above to see their official value.

I'm fairly pleased with that.

#RecMath #RecMaths #Astronomy #Equinox

St George’s Drive, Port Sunlight

BRIDOL 7998: St George’s Drive, Port Sunlight

Mar 22 at 5:48pmWeb
Show threadDonovan Young4d ago
@ColinTheMathmo 11 sig figs?
Show threadColin the Mathmo4d ago

@Dyoung No, that's just the result of the calculation. Now it needs proper error analysis to account for the uncertainties, and then the proper result.

That's yet to come.

Show threadDonovan Young4d ago
@ColinTheMathmo sounds really fun.
Show threadColin the Mathmo4d ago

@Dyoung It's wonderful what you can do with a stick, a piece of string, a ruler, and some ingenuity.

The challenge after this is ... how can you reduce the uncertainty and increase the accuracy, again with very simple items.