US Navy Navigation Equipment

[zzyzzogeton]

In addition to knives, swords, sabers, axes, hatchets and spears, one of the things I collect is US Navy navigation equipment. My most recent acquisition is a Mk3 Mod 0 Clinometer, made in 1942.

Clinometers used to determine the degree of trim/pitch and heel a ship is experiencing at any time.

Trim is the angular measurement of how out of level the line form the bow to the stern is while stationary in port.

Pitch is how much the bow/stern are moving up and down while the ship is underway.

Heel is the angular shift in ship's position as it rolls back and forth, from port to starboard. That's left and right for non-squids.

Typically, heel clinometers measure up to 70º. Trim/pitch clinometers typically max out at 15º or 20º.

[Kolvir]

That is a really cool collectable. Are navigation instruments pretty expensive to collect?

[fergusontd]

We had, as navigation equipment, an OOD with no sense of direction. BTW we had a list indicator to measure the side to side pitch, seen it once at 44°! ftd

[jerryd6818]

In addition to knives, swords, sabers, axes, hatchets and spears, one of the things I collect is US Navy navigation equipment. My most recent acquisition is a Mk3 Mod 0 Clinometer, made in 1942.

Clinometers used to determine the degree of trim/pitch and heel a ship is experiencing at any time.

Trim is the angular measurement of how out of level the line form the bow to the stern is while stationary in port.

Pitch is how much the bow/stern are moving up and down while the ship is underway.

Heel is the angular shift in ship's position as it rolls back and forth, from port to starboard. That's left and right for non-squids.

Typically, heel clinometers measure up to 70º. Trim/pitch clinometers typically max out at 15º or 20º.

A heel of 70º?? Scares the bejesus out of me just thinking about it. Dang, I'm glad I didn't join the Navy.

[fergusontd]

[/quote]
A heel of 70º?? Scares the bejesus out of me just thinking about it. Dang, I'm glad I didn't join the Navy.
[/quote]
Yup! The Marines are still in search of a few? good men! Just think of all the fun you missed! ftd

A typical day

[zzyzzogeton]

We had, as navigation equipment, an OOD with no sense of direction. BTW we had a list indicator to measure the side to side pitch, seen it once at 44°! ftd

That would be the "Heel/Roll Clinometer". List is the static measurement of heel, how far the ship is leaning one way or the other, when at rest in port. "Heeling" is the active movement of the ship during a turn to the side opposite the direction of the turn. Pitching is the rhythmic oscillation of the ship's long axis while moving through waves.

Heel is the port to starboard "out of plumb" measurement and trim is to fore and aft "out of plumb". Using a carpenter/mason term to refer to how the mast appears compared to the water surface. Rolling is the side to side equivalent of pitching. Then there is yawing as well.

Y'all non-squids never knew the Navy had so many term for how a ship moves did you? Someday, I'll give a lecture on the difference between "small stuff", "rope", "line" and "cable", just to really confuse the conversation.

My interest in US Navy navigation equipment/tools comes from being a retired Surface Warfare Officer who had billets as CIC Officer, Ship's Navigator 2x, and stood watches as CICWO (2 ships), JOOW (1 ship), JOOD (2 ships) and OOD (3 ships), all positions in which navigation was important to different levels of concern.

Besides, they just wouldn't let me stuff a 3"/50 or 5"/54 in my seabag to bring home.

Yeah, 70º would be drastic, but can be survived. Has to do with centers of gravity vs centers of bouyancy. That's a 2 hour lecture.

[jerryd6818]

JerryD Wrote:
heel of 70º?? Scares the bejesus out of me just thinking about it. Dang, I'm glad I didn't join the Navy.

Ferg Replied:
Yup! The Marines are still in search of a few? good men! Just think of all the fun you missed! ftdSmartSelect_20200802-080629_Chrome.jpg

Didn't miss it entirely. Went through a major storm in the Atlantic in November of '64 on our way back from Operation Steel Pike. I don't recall us heeling over but I did take a peek out one of the hatches and we were burying the bow of the ship in some of the biggest waves I'd ever seen.

[knife7knut]

We had, as navigation equipment, an OOD with no sense of direction. BTW we had a list indicator to measure the side to side pitch, seen it once at 44°! ftd

That would be the "Heel/Roll Clinometer". List is the static measurement of heel, how far the ship is leaning one way or the other, when at rest in port. "Heeling" is the active movement of the ship during a turn to the side opposite the direction of the turn. Pitching is the rhythmic oscillation of the ship's long axis while moving through waves.

Heel is the port to starboard "out of plumb" measurement and trim is to fore and aft "out of plumb". Using a carpenter/mason term to refer to how the mast appears compared to the water surface. Rolling is the side to side equivalent of pitching. Then there is yawing as well.

Y'all non-squids never knew the Navy had so many term for how a ship moves did you? Someday, I'll give a lecture on the difference between "small stuff", "rope", "line" and "cable", just to really confuse the conversation.

My interest in US Navy navigation equipment/tools comes from being a retired Surface Warfare Officer who had billets as CIC Officer, Ship's Navigator 2x, and stood watches as CICWO (2 ships), JOOW (1 ship), JOOD (2 ships) and OOD (3 ships), all positions in which navigation was important to different levels of concern.

Besides, they just wouldn't let me stuff a 3"/50 or 5"/54 in my seabag to bring home.

Yeah, 70º would be drastic, but can be survived. Has to do with centers of gravity vs centers of bouyancy. That's a 2 hour lecture.

That brought back a lot of memories! I wasn't a "boat sailor but an "Airedale".The only one I couldn't decipher was the CICWO. I had a good friend who was headed for a Med Cruise back in the 60's on a "tin can" in the North Atlantic and they were doing heels of almost 60 degrees.Dare I say there was virtually no one aboard who didn't,"talk to O-Rourke". Glad I wasn't there!
BTW I was a,"BB stacker" at NATC Pax River.

[zzyzzogeton]

CICWO is Combat Information Center Watch Officer. CICO is Combat Information Center Officer.

The CICO is the Division Officer who (after the CPO or PO1) runs the CIC division. These are the OSs, e.g., Operations Specialists. The old rating -RD or Radarman was introduced in 1943 when ships started getting radars. In 1972, RD split into OS, ET (Electronics Technician) and EW (Electronic Warfare Specialist).

The CICWO is the junior officer on the watch crew in CIC during a watch period. The CICWO will be an E6 - E9 (last is RARE), a CWO1-CWO4, or an O1 - O3, rarely an O4. How senior depends on the ship. An LST might have an E6 as the senior enlisted, and an O1 as Division Officer. At the other end of the spectrum, on an aircraft carrier, the senior enlisted will be an E7 minimum but most likely an E8 or rarely an E9, with the CICO being an O3 or even an O4, seldom an O2.

That's all underway/deployed. Go into the yards for a 9 to 12 month overhaul and you may end up with an Ensign in charge of damn near anything as all the really experience people will get transfered to other ships rather than be wasted in port. Then just before a ship gets out of the yards, a bunch of "experienced" people will suddenly show up for workups and training.

It's a career killer to be an ensign assigned to a carrier just going into the yards. You'll come out of the yards knowing all the paperwork BS but be WAY behind on all operational and tactical stuff.

[Dinadan]

That clinometer brought back a memory for me. Back in 1973 I was on my first ship. Not long after I joined we got in some pretty heavy seas (to me, anyway). A small group of us young fellows was talking about how much we were rolling. An old geezer, maybe 26 or 28 years old and and an E6 heard us. He informed us that he had been on the bridge and that the clinometer indicated that we were rolling 24 degrees. One of the fellows said: "I wonder how far we can roll before we just turn over." Without breaking a smile the old geezer said "25 degrees." When he saw the look on our faces he quickly added that he was just joking about the 25 degrees and he had no idea how much of a roll we could take! I still remember that incident vividly. That was about the worst seas I experienced.

[steve99f]

That is a cool instrument ZZ, nice pick up. Went through a typhoon or two near Taiwan back in the early 70's on the DD, pretty near walking on the bulkheads. Never did find out what the max roll was. Being a snipe on watch in the bottom of the ship, the effect wasn't quite as bad as on the main deck or higher. Keeping the water level in sight in the boilers was challenging in those conditions. The boiler drums were set on the long axis of the ship so rolling was a problem. Great fun though.

[Quick Steel]

I have a question that I hope one of you sailors will answer. Over the years in photos, movies etc. looking out from the bridge there is always a circular something on a front window with a thin line inside it which looks like it traverses around the circumference of this circle. I haven't described it very well, but hope someone can identify what I am referring to.

[zzyzzogeton]

I have a question that I hope one of you sailors will answer. Over the years in photos, movies etc. looking out from the bridge there is always a circular something on a front window with a thin line inside it which looks like it traverses around the circumference of this circle. I haven't described it very well, but hope someone can identify what I am referring to.

It is a centrifugal windshield wiper. It spins the water off so you can see through without ever having to replace wiper blades.

[Quick Steel]

Thank you for that info. I've wondered about it a long time.

[jerryd6818]

The Squids are so clever. The Marine Corps would have a Private standing out there squeegeeing it off. He gets washed away. No problem. Just get another Private. We got plenty of them.

[knife7knut]

The Squids are so clever. The Marine Corps would have a Private standing out there squeegeeing it off. He gets washed away. No problem. Just get another Private. We got plenty of them.

As a,"squid" who was stationed with many Marines I was always amazed with the rivalry between the two branches.About half of the pilots in our outfit were Marines with a couple Army and Air Force to round out the All Services Evaluation Group.I don't know who was the crazier of the two:the Marine pilot who was convinced he could barrel roll a CH-53 helicopter that we were doing BIS trials on or the Navy pilot;a lieutenant commander who looked and behaved like a preacher(no smoking,drinking or swearing)who during a spin recovery test on an F-4 and had been ordered to punch out if he couldn't pull it out of the spin by 10,000 ft. finally managed to get it out at about 3,000. As he said afterward,"I had one hand on the stick and the other on the curtain!" They were going to ground him for 60 days for disobeying an order but the CO intervened because the project was so essential. He sadly was killed AFTER he left the service testing an aircraft for General Dynamics.

[jerryd6818]

Nothin' but a bunch of crazy kids Ray. I went through Construction Electrician School with the Seabees at Port Hueneme and CW Radar School with the Army at Fort Bliss Texas. We poked at each other constantly but boy did we have fun.

[knife7knut]

Nothin' but a bunch of crazy kids Ray. I went through Construction Electrician School with the Seabees at Port Hueneme and CW Radar School with the Army at Fort Bliss Texas. We poked at each other constantly but boy did we have fun.

That we are(were)amigo! My AO school class in Jax was 50% Marine.We had several in the outfit in Pax River and some of the best fun was our monthly division parties.Plenty of beer and the softball games were,"full contact". Officers against enlisted and whatever happened at the parties stayed there.I remember getting roaring drunk with our XO (a full commander)and pouring beer all over his shoes and both of us laughing like hell about it. Another thing about there was if you were enlisted and you did the pressure chamber check and rode the seat you could get a ride in the back of an F-4. One of our guys was going out for his first and we told the pilot who asked for an unrestricted takeoff on the 13,000 ft runway. Got it rolling and airborne in about 3,000 and at the end of the runway that went out into Chesapeake Bay went to max afterburner and stood it on it's tail pulling about 5G's.Rode it to about 65,000 and both engines flamed out.Took about 15,000 ft to re-light them.They were out about 15 minutes and had a complete pneumatic system failure(both PC-1 & PC-2)and had to bail out.They were in the bay about 45 minutes before we pulled them out.They were both laughing about the experience on the way back to the base. I got checked out and was supposed to go TAD to Hanscom Field in Bedford Mass(about 14 miles from home)for 6 weeks on a Sparrow missile project with Raytheon but my leading chief nixed it because he knew it was near my home and I was getting out soon and we weren't exactly bosom buddies.So I never got my ride in an F-4.

[jerryd6818]

Nothin' but a bunch of crazy kids Ray. I went through Construction Electrician School with the Seabees at Port Hueneme and CW Radar School with the Army at Fort Bliss Texas. We poked at each other constantly but boy did we have fun.

That we are(were)amigo! My AO school class in Jax was 50% Marine.We had several in the outfit in Pax River and some of the best fun was our monthly division parties.Plenty of beer and the softball games were,"full contact". Officers against enlisted and whatever happened at the parties stayed there.I remember getting roaring drunk with our XO (a full commander)and pouring beer all over his shoes and both of us laughing like hell about it. Another thing about there was if you were enlisted and you did the pressure chamber check and rode the seat you could get a ride in the back of an F-4. One of our guys was going out for his first and we told the pilot who asked for an unrestricted takeoff on the 13,000 ft runway. Got it rolling and airborne in about 3,000 and at the end of the runway that went out into Chesapeake Bay went to max afterburner and stood it on it's tail pulling about 5G's.Rode it to about 65,000 and both engines flamed out.Took about 15,000 ft to re-light them.They were out about 15 minutes and had a complete pneumatic system failure(both PC-1 & PC-2)and had to bail out.They were in the bay about 45 minutes before we pulled them out.They were both laughing about the experience on the way back to the base. I got checked out and was supposed to go TAD to Hanscom Field in Bedford Mass(about 14 miles from home)for 6 weeks on a Sparrow missile project with Raytheon but my leading chief nixed it because he knew it was near my home and I was getting out soon and we weren't exactly bosom buddies.So I never got my ride in an F-4.

Dang!! That was an expensive joy ride. (assuming the F-4 was not salvageable or even if it was)
The F-4 Phantom and the C-130 were the only two planes I could recognize. The C-130 has a pretty unique profile so it was easy to pick out of a crowd. As for the F-4, our HAWK Missile Battery at MCAS Cherry Point was set up on the apron of the strip where the F-4's did their "touch & go" practice. That's part of the reason I developed hearing issues. The raw power of those studs of the airways is just awesome. I am Phantom, hear me roar!

[knife7knut]

[/quote]
Dang!! That was an expensive joy ride. (assuming the F-4 was not salvageable or even if it was)
The F-4 Phantom and the C-130 were the only two planes I could recognize. The C-130 has a pretty unique profile so it was easy to pick out of a crowd. As for the F-4, our HAWK Missile Battery at MCAS Cherry Point was set up on the apron of the strip where the F-4's did their "touch & go" practice. That's part of the reason I developed hearing issues. The raw power of those studs of the airways is just awesome. I am Phantom, hear me roar!
[/quote]

My first duty station after boot camp was NAS Boca Chica(Key West)where I worked the transit line.We would get a lot of Marine(and other)aircraft that were coming in from Gitmo or Rosey Roads PR and had to go through customs before they could deplane.Ir was amazing the number of places you could store hooch on an F-8 Crusader! In the wheelhouse inside the downlock bag(they put them in the cockpit)or inside the IFR probe door.Very imaginative!
Speaking of touch and go's I was driving the Follow Me truck one night to lead an aircraft in because we only had one runway open and there was a lot of construction going on.The aircraft was an Air Force T-33 with a code 5(major general)aboard.My buddy Neil was in the tower that night.In order to get to the transit line I had to pick the plane up at the end of the runway,lead him half way up the taxiway and then on to the runway to the line.As I'm starting out Neil calls and says there is an F-4 that was doing touch and go's and he will be making a low level pass over us. As I'm going up the runway I see the F-4's lights dropping lower & lower and then the pilot of the T-33 starts flashing his lights on and off frantically thinking the approaching plane doesn't see us!(Neil never bothered to notify the T-33 pilot of the flyby)
That F-4 lit the burner just before he reached us and I could count rivets on the bottom of it he was so low! Got to the line and the canopy on the T-33 was up and the general scrambling out of the rear seat with steam coming out of his ears! The OOD was out to meet him and he stormed past him and up the stairs of the tower and chewed Neil's ass out for about a half hour! Some great memories!

[jerryd6818]

Love it.

[zzyzzogeton]

Finally scored a trim clinometer. This one is from the 1980s, not from WW2, but they haven't changed since then.



These are mounted along the centerline up on the bridge.

In port, it is used to determine how out of trim a ship is (how many degrees out of level), fore and aft wise.

Underway, it shows how much pitching (bow moving up and down) the ship is doing.

[treefarmer]

Jerry, you need to quit releasing such top secret info!
Treefarmer

[zzyzzogeton]

This is a Hamilton 4992B 22 Jewel Bureau of Ships US Navy Comparing Watch. The engraving on the back is dated 1943. The serial number inside breaks down to having been made in 1941. That is most likely because Hamilton made a ton of them in 1941 and this one sat arround in storage until it was engraved and issued.

A Comparing Watch was issued with each Chronometer issued to a ship, and a ship is usually issued 3 chronometers.
Comparing watches were used for a variety of tasks.

One of them was for one of the Ship's Quartermasters (which have absolutely NOTHING to do with supplies) to go around the ship and wind and reset all the mechanical clocks on the ship.

Another use was during celestial navigation sitings. The Navigator and Chief Quartermaster would take multiple sitings on several of the 54 "navigation stars" at dawn and dusk, and to take sun sitings during the day. One of the junior quartermasters would write down the time when the Navigator or Chief Quartermaster said "Mark" indicating he had taken a siting on the star being "shot". The recording Quartermaster would write down the time to the nearest second so that the ship's position fix is as accurate as possible.

Face


Engraving on back


The guts

[jerryd6818]

That right there is quite a time piece Wayne.