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WAB squares for Channel Islands

Posted: Thu May 02, 2013 11:21 pm
by DamianM0BKV
For some time I've wondered why I couldn't find a way of working out Channel Islands OS grid locators ie. WV54 and then I saw on the 'Bees, Wasps & Ants Recording Society' web site :-
All Channel Island grid refs are UTM references, usually expressed without the UTM Grid Area prefix of 30U. You can set Google Earth to deliver UTM refs by going to: Tools > Options and selecting UTM from the relevant display on offer.
Well without Google Earth it's not so easy but there is an Excel spread sheet for conversion from LAT & LONG. - 'map UTM convert.xlsx' - I've uploaded it to the WAB Yahoo reflector files area.
This EXCEL file will convert from Lat' and Long' to the world UTM grid system as used by the Ordnance Survey (and WAB) for the channel Islands. You can use Google Maps to obtain the LAT & LONG before starting. Use the EXCEL spreadsheet 'Military Grid Reference' readout to view the result of the calculation 'WV' prefix bit.
There is a converter online, I found once, as an alternative that gives it correctly. Most of them give the answer as some fictitious grid as experienced recently by an 'MJ' portable station. These assume the calculation to be the standard OS grid which it isn't.

Re: WAB squares for Channel Islands

Posted: Mon May 27, 2013 1:45 pm
by DamianM0BKV
I noted from my last posting on this subject a few weeks ago that although you can get the Jersey and other channel Island WAB square from Google Earth it isn't straight forward.
First open Google Earth and select - Tools/Options/3Dview. Then select 'Universal Transverse Mercator'. Save this by clicking Apply or whatever. Now view the Google Earth map with the place in Jersey that has an unknown WAB square. Move this to the center of the map on your screen. Click on the yellow pin in the top of the map Toolbar and this then should appear in the unknown point of interest on the map with lots of information including Zone 3U which you can ignore. Note first Easting = 5*******E and second Northing = 54********N.
Well the first character in Easting = 5 represents the 'W' and first 2x characters in Northing = 54 represents the 'V'.
The character following the 5 (in other words the second number in the Easting) is the WAB 1st number of interest. The character following the 54 (in other words the third number in the Northing) is the WAB 2nd number of interest. These two numbers are the WAB square numbers that follow the WV (for Jersey) that you use to complete the 4digit square reference.
I'm sure somebody else can explain it all better. Note for Alderney WA are represented by W = 5 ( which is the same) and the A by the number 55 (the first 2 Northing numbers).