which way is north?

[bledd]

google maps

 

[Skiddley]

Magnetic north, or geographical north?

 

[yantorsen]

Find a cup of water, a cork, and a needle and you can make yourself a rudimentary compass.

that would not work, you need to charge the pin first by rubbing it against another metal or something static.

 

[Participant]

Start walking and if you begin seeing more people with their tops off in the freezing cold, you're heading north.

 

[Jimmeh]

Prevailing wind comes from the SW. Find a flag!





Please note that I'm talking utter *******s.

 

[Nanobot]

Depends on which North you want, true North or Magnetic North...

Edit: Beaten.

 

[ConTRo13R]

Start walking and if you begin seeing more people with their tops off in the freezing cold, you're heading north.

Fat people with there tops off

 

[Darg]

I don't know what it is, whether it's my subconscious keeping track of my movement or the lighting but I always seem to have a 'hunch' where north is and generally I'm not more then 10-15deg off.

If it's dark then find the north star, follow the direction of the last two stars to the right hand side of the plow until you find a brightish star about two inches (when hand held out) from the last star.

Otherwise any of the compass tricks above will work.

EDIT: I assume my above time trick with the sun and your watch would work if you knew the time of moon rise and moonset too.

 

[Conscript]

Double post, ignore

 

[Conscript]

that would not work, you need to charge the pin first by rubbing it against another metal or something static.

I didn't go into detail. I thought it was a universally known technique.

 

[p4radox]

ignore

 

[Darg]

So just add a magnet to the original quote, and it would work.

EDIT: Double post, ignore

I didn't go into detail. I thought it was a universally known technique.

What I like is that you actually answered him twice without realising

 

[yantorsen]

I didn't go into detail. I thought it was a universally known technique.

fair enough, just you made it seem simple, but it's not always easy to find something to charge the pin with, you oversimplified it.

 

[p4radox]

http://www.learn-orienteering.org/old/nocompass1.html

If you have an analog wrist watch, you can use the time to find north. Hold your watch up in front of you, and let the short hand, red on the figure, that indicates hours point at the sun. While holding it like this, cut the angle between the red arrow and 12 o'clock in two, (noonwards if the time is before 6am or after 6pm), that way is south. (The reason you need to cut it in two, is because the clock takes two rotations while the sun takes one around the earth, it is of course the other way around, but never mind.)

 

[Darg]

http://www.learn-orienteering.org/old/nocompass1.html

My method is more accurate

Well basically the same apart from the fact that 12pm is very rarely the suns highest point in the sky.

If you could very accurately measure mavity then you could theoretically measure a few different spots a few km apart. The place with the most mavity would be furthest north.

 

[SimonCHere]

>>> That way.


It's pretty simple, get the location of the sunrise, location of the sunset, get the midpoint between them then you know that is south and the other direction is north.

(I know some astronomer is going to come in with some sort of earth wobble theory)

EDIT:

Another way, if you just know the time of the sunrise and sunset, get the midpoint in time between them then point the hour hand of your watch at the sun, halfway between the mid-time and the hour hand will be south, opposite direction is north.

You don't actually need the times.
Northern hemisphere:
Point the hour hand towards the sun: the mid point between the hour hand and 12 o'clock is north/south. Just use the time of day and the position of the sun to tell you which way is which!
Southern is the same but you point the 12 towards the sun.

In the dark you're stuffed!

[edit] Way too slow it seems!

 

[Darg]

You don't actually need the times.
Northern hemisphere:
Point the hour hand towards the sun: the mid point between the hour hand and 12 o'clock is north/south. Just use the time of day and the position of the sun to tell you which way is which!
Southern is the same but you point the 12 towards the sun.

In the dark you're stuffed!

Like I said above midday is very rarely actually midday. Sometimes the suns midpoint can be as far off as 1pm. Obviously the closer you are to your timezones midpoint the closer real midday is to chronological midday.

 

[Conscript]

What I like is that you actually answered him twice without realising

I went to edit the original post just to make the wording a bit clearer but hit the new post button. Thank you for highlighting my mistake though

 

[Judge Mental]

Second on the left after the gasworks.

 

[Darg]

I went to edit the original post just to make the wording a bit clearer but hit the new post button. Thank you for highlighting my mistake though

You have to be quicker then that to hide your shame around here!