Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 January 2010
The Loran C radio position-fixing system has been described in technical detail at international conferences and elsewhere. This paper tries to convey the general ‘feel’ of the system and its characteristics and to indicate, with as few irrelevancies as possible, what sort of process makes the two readout counters go round and give the navigator his position fix. The equipment to which the paper refers is the AN/SPN-31 marine Loran C receiver, which was designed and produced by Decca to a U.S. Bureau of Ships specification. Individual makes of Loran C set differ in various ways, but SPN-31 will serve for illustrative purposes.