Here is this week’s binnacle:
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According to the lamentably brief article in Wikipedia, the coloured orbs either side of the binacle are permanent magnets designed to compensate for the magnetic field of the ship. Their position relative to the compass (inside the binacle) can be adjusted in order that the compass can be more sensitive to the Earth’s magnetic field.
I’m sure there are many at Hooting Yard, who mourn the demise of the Ship’s binnacle, however all is not lost. You could, for example equip your ship with a superb Anchutz Gyro-compass.
I lament the end of the age of elegance when I compere the “Binnacle Of The Week” with the utilitarian Anchutz Gyro-compass.
I feel a ballad coming on…
Wait a moment! Having donned my Raymond Baxter Perception Booster Spectacles I now realise that this so called “Binnacle Of The Week” is non other than the Uber Tharbin from the Electro-pneumatic Televisor science fiction series “Tiny Enid Defeats The Threatened Invasion Of Earth By The Tharbin Elite Invasion Squad Under The Command Of The Terrifying Uber Tharbin”. I was initially deceived by this “binnacle” because the original programmes where broadcast in sepia and this picture is in colour….
Shame on your Hooting Yard Binnacle Of The Week researcher for practising such a base deception on us myopic readers!
The spheres are not magnets. They are soft iron spheres known to seamen as “Lord Kelvin’s Balls” after the name of the man who invented them. They compensate for the inherent magnetism in a steel ship.
Compensating Magnets are also housed in the body of the binnacle. On the forward side is mounted an iron “Flinders Bar” also to compensate for ships magnetism.