CORRECT TIMES.

Auckland Star, Volume XLII, Issue 136, 9 June 1911, Page 4

CORRECT TIMES.

TIMEBALL REQUIRED LOCAIiLY, The question of being able to . the correct time here, is reaard.n t MUt » masters of oversea immense importance, and Uptain ?? ? ley's letter, which has beeiiw. 01 "* to the Harbour Board to th wSKS I partment, opens a matter J%*§ porian-ce. * aom e u». The navigating lieutenant of a Tos 1 which js a constant visitor totiX and who takes a keen bfcUW subject, forwards us the 8K& "" planatory communication:-- m S «• "If a ball is to be worked there is only L*SSHffl! be of use to the shipping j___* _ v general," he wrttes, Mount Victoria, as there it , 8 0l » available all over the &£ -J__* W side and inside. There is ' no urgently needed, and **££% * b service to deep water shjpT __ 2*B sent method of rating £»££?« inconvenient and uareffi^f I, > stance, a captain is loading wT* leavmg Jn a lew days for >S'? Europe, via Cape Horn, and is nff 0t of his chronometer error^orS"l He has to go and mnL-» <,»— J"* with the rosfoffiSaSSl tarn time from the Wellington Mss, tory, and take this on a 3£_£ ly compared with the chronoml S |go back on board and eompara'S chronometer again. Only can he obtain the error of W 8 » eter on Greenwich mean time, andl error compared with that of ui»''M Serration either here or in «|® gives the daily rate, that fcSi I amount the chronometer feM losing per day. The error used to keep the chronemeter coirS t.l the next check is taken. ™ C - B> "- "Sometimes, in fact very off-n '* chronometer itself is taken up ftp 0 so as to get a direct check and Si to a watch. This is a very .had X, the movement of the &£&! transit, no matter how careful «»•_," be, as well a s the difference of -ternlS ture, all combine to upset the daily [M sometimes for days afterwards. "On the other hand ivitli a -time ball the chronometer is not touched an „ffi cer watches the ball,sbmout it drops, and another officer watch MI chronometer records the time an M tains the error, etc., and the whole,l* formance is finished in a tew momenl and without disturbing the instrument; ft hen you thmk that 4 seconds 0 time is equal to 1 mile;of longitude it makes one realize what an;important matter it is to get good errors and rata They ensure safe navigation, and; ai everyone knows, the men'on. mail-boati and cargo steamers have fiotmisch apart time during the day in port, and it ij often impossible for them to get to tit Post Office and take these signals: "If a ball were established on Jit. Ti> toria or any other position it could li arranged fo drop at noon daily from Wellington Observatory, and would onlt require a clear line for about 2 minutk Of course the best arrangement will! be to set up a little observatory and put a man in charge who would take the observations himself and control the «_■ nal. They have already an astronomical clock in the Harbour Board fitted in con* necfion with the ball on the roof of that building, so alp that-would: rerily.be required would be a small...hiiildingrWd transit instrument with a ;fe#; odils and ends and the strings;.complete. > Jn.-a»' elusion, I may be perfect requires Ahe felty ioi.B,\>a&' ground, and to stand clear 'by:its«lf <md> . manding a view of, the entire harbour, It as this that makes mc conclude tint the positihn on Mount Victoria is an ideal one, and could not ho excelled for the Waitemata." >. ; ' ■' "-