Amazing ! At a time when GPS networks are multiplying (GPS, GLONASS, Beidou-2, and soon Galileo) a genius engineer, sailing enthusiast, creates a company and invents the replacement for dad's sextant : an electronic sextant requiring no knowledge, with a claimed accuracy of less than one nautical mile, the G-Stell.
At the Nautic of Paris, on the iTabNav stand for ten days, unfortunately I did not have time to meet Franck Polidor, when he presented his jewel. But I read everything the press wrote about him, and frankly I regret having missed it. I have already reported, in several posts (¹) of my attachment to this wonderful instrument that is the sextant, and I am sincerely amazed to see a creator launch such an innovative product going against the grain of current navigation systems.
By relying on two Norman high-tech SMEs, Sominex for the electronic part and Starnav for astral navigation, G-Stell handles like a riflescope. Equipped with an inertial unit, a camera and appropriate electronics, G-Stell recognizes the targeted stars, measures angles and manages calculations. It connects to a computer to display results. Still in testing phase, the objective is to achieve an accuracy of less than one nautical mile.
This is a tool that could be of great interest to the merchant navy., a sextant being always obligatory on board ships. And for us other boaters, if by chance a catastrophe deprived us of the GPS system, a solution like G-Stell could be beneficial, especially since it is not certain that we will be able to find traditional sextants in production for much longer..
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(¹) About alignments and sextant / Celestial – the astro point on iPhone and iPad
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