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Report on the Ships' Compass.*

[Second Report of the LiverpoolCompass Committeeto the Board of Trade.]
Errors arising from the Heeling of Iron Ships.--These are among the
most perplexing which demands a captain's attention. As a number of
causes may conspire to produce, modify, or cancel their effect, it is not
surprising therefore that the knowledge obtained oil this subject is very
incomplete. Among such causes may be named the following:
The rising or lowering of the attracting mass, causing its magnetism
to act with greater or less leverage as it approaches to, or recedes
from, the plane of the compass card.
Vertical iron or magnets below and near the compass.
Induced vertical polarity in iron deck beams, increasing as they incline
from their usual horizontal position.
Proximity of badly proportioned and badly placed chain-boxes.
Action of horizontal compensating magnets when they are placed be-
low and too near the compass card.
This last, though partially corrective of some errors from heeling in
certain positions of the ship, appear to aggravate them in others.
The three first-named causes may be described as tending to attract
the north end of the needle to the weather side of the ship in north mag-
netic latitude, and to leeward in the south magnetic hemisphere ; and as
increasing or decreasing the usual deviations according to their name
and the direction of the ship's head. These three may act in the same
direction and in the same ship. It is difficult to estimate their separate
effects, but the last is supposed to be most prejudicial. The great ex-
pense attendant on heeling and swinging ship in port, and the delay
caused by such an experiment where every hour is valuable, have as yet
prevented its being thoroughly tested. Deductions can only be made,
therefore, from the evidence afforded by various captains, and an in-
spection of the arrangement of the iron near the compasses of their
respective ships.
Evidence from a number of captains shows--
1. That in*a large portion of iron ships the compasses are affected by
heeling.
2. That errors from heeling are generally most complained of when
ships are on or near four-point courses.
3. That when iron ships have heeled over for a considerable time
upon northerly courses, they have been found to windward of their dead
reckonings.
To these may be added the existence of an impression among compass
adjusters and others who have paid attention to the subject (among the
latter may be named the managing owner of the Cunard Company, Mr.
Charles M'Iver, a gentleman of great experience in iron ships), that iron
deck beams are a chief cause of compass disturbances.
The following may also be quoted from a number of other cases:
Captain Bonthllow of the steamship "Laconia" states, that the same
course which with an even beam would make the Smalls from the coast
• From the Lond. Cir. Eng. and Arch. Jour., Jan., 1850.