Boatnerd Discussion Forum

RDF was a great aid to navigation. when you had two different fixes, you knew your exact position. the signals were broadcast during a ten minutes duration every hour from each station. each signal had a different identifying tone. once you learned how to 'null out' the signal - they were quite accurate.

[quote="edm"]that's the problem with fog horns - you can not tell which direction they come from, in a fog, and you can not tell how far away they are. I can not believe these are still used today ! these are totally useless in a fog.[/quote]

Back in the days of fog horns and radio-direction-finder stations, some were co-located and synchronized so that if, for instance, you heard the fog horn sound 5 seconds later than the RDF signal, you were 1 mile away from the fog horn-RDF location, and your RDF gave you the bearing to the station, so you knew right where you were. Got into Two Harbors in my small boat one very foggy day that way.

[quote="edm"]that's the problem with fog horns - you can not tell which direction they come from, in a fog, and you can not tell how far away they are. I can not believe these are still used today ! these are totally useless in a fog.[/quote]

Now a days, are Fog Horns for the freighters, as much as for the recreation boater? There was a walleye fishing tournament, on Lake St . Clair, most of the contestants are in small runabouts, not the Bigger boats docked in G Pointe. I am thinking.

that's the problem with fog horns - you can not tell which direction they come from, in a fog, and you can not tell how far away they are. I can not believe these are still used today ! these are totally useless in a fog.

St Clair Light

i live around Masonic and Jefferson in St Clair Shores. I have been hearing a fog horn all morning. I have lived here 35 years and have heard the freighters but never a fog horn. Where is the nearest foghorn on Lake St.Clair?