Button Compass -- Thoughts and Recommendations

Hi,

So, per the Watch thread, if I go with a basic date/time only model, could always get a button compass for the watch band.

While I know even the better models are good for only general direction and may receive interference from the watch itself (so I'll look for one that can be readily removable); given that, what button compasses do all like and/or which ones do you all recommend we avoid?

I looked through old posts and didn't see one discussing button compasses directly.

The thing is-when you really need to use a compass, you trust it absolutely to be correct. I have yet to find a button compass on which I could depend. Spend a little more, allot a bit more space and get something that works and that is dependable-Suunto is one good brand.

I have spent most my time in the western US. I have rarely needed to use a compass, since it is very easy to navigate by terrain features.

Do a search on ETS -- there was a button compass thread. Someone recommended this brand of brass button compasses which are apparently adjusted for declination. Rather pricey. That may work better if you need to rely on a button compass.

But, really, an orienteering compass is just better.

Instead of button compass I would recommend the Suunto M9 wrist compass on your other hand. It looks cheap but is quite a good quality compass for showing the general directions.

I have one myself. Didn´t like the original wrist strap so I replaced it with a nato strap.

My experience has been that these small compasses will provide a trend of direction (northeast,north) and that is about it. About the same as those ball compasses with the safety pin.

Blake

www.outdoorquest.blogspot.com

no personal experience with it, and no affiliations, but this looks promising

I also suspect a button compass (or even a regular full size compass) is no different than any other piece of gear, it should regularly be checked against a known and reliable standard for accuracy, as well as to be sure it hasn't been damaged or otherwise compromised

I have a couple of button compasses, sunto, they both quite working well after a few months being carried around in my pack. I back to a basic scout type silva I have had for at least 25 years.

I have had this button compass for a few years. It points in exactly the same direction as more compasses I have. I have tested it on top of mountains in Tahoe. Please note it is fluid filled.

http://www.survivalresources.com/store/product.php?productid=16186&page=1

Even though one has not failed on me, I use this type of compass as backup. I would NOT recommend trying to put this on a watch because it is a bit too thick for that. Also, you effectively turn your rugged watch into a delicate bracelet with which you must be careful.

Izzy, I figure about the best we can expect from a button compass is to get a general sense of direction.

Wow, clearwater, I'd expect a button compass to last longer than a few months, looks like I have some gear testing to do asap

ireckon, are those compasses like the ones in the PSP? they sure look like it, although they also look like a lot of the ones I bought on the cheap in bulk and had shipped here from China, I'm sure the ones I bought imitated the look of these better compasses on purpose

Yes, one needs to assume a button compass is always 10-30 degrees off. but its not for fine work, its for getting a very general sense of direction.

I like the idea of small compasses that can slide onto a watch strap. I figure that if I do end up having put the compass to use I'd have somewhere to keep it.

That said, a ways back I picked up a Coughlan's wrist compass for a backup (shown in this thread), but unfortunately it didn't last. I had packed it into one of my small kits and when I went through it recently I noticed the compass was no longer working; the disk in it was jammed and no longer rotated. I've seen the Suunto one Mark mentioned and thought it might be a good replacement, but haven't picked anything up yet.

On a related note, I've been practicing using the sun for direction using my watch and that'll have to suffice for my back up for now. Of course, in addition to my real compass I usually have my GPS (no built in compass) & powered-off iPhone too, so going without the button-sized backup maybe isn't that big of a deal .

yeah denis, there's always alternative ways to determine a general direction, my thoughts on keeping the button compass around are when those alternative methods are not available. I'm thinking specifically of heavily overcast/rainy days or nights, when the sun, shadows, and stars are not available for navigation or determining direction. Or when you're in thick forested areas such as our area, a favorite local saying is "they have to have sunlight pumped in"

What's a PSP? Anyway, if your compasses from China are not fluid filled, then they're not the same. There is a difference in performance.

PSP = Pocket Survival Pak

yeah the ones I ordered are liquid filled, but these days, I look at anything made in, and especially items on e-bay or other sites shipped directly from, china, as suspect in quality, esp when they look exactly like items costing 10 times more

Me too. The problem is almost everything is made in China. Even iPhones are made in China.

Where I live, no declination adjustment is needed, so a pocket watch type compass is all I need for a primary and a liquid filled button compass for a backup. In the northern part of Minnesota, magnetic compasses don't work reliably, no matter the cost or complexity, due to the four iron ranges there.

I carry a simple base plate compass in my pack for planning with a map, an old pocket watch style compass in my pocket for hiking, and a button compass or a pin-on bubble in my small survival pack. I only need to know the general direction to walk the old logging roads or prairies.

When out grouse hunting, I use the pin on bubble to insure that I took the right turn on the logging road intersection. I only need the button compass as a secondary backup. I buy them a dozen at a time, sprinkle a few around the vehicles and various packs, and give the rest to little nieces and nephews.

I have only had one button compass totally fail, and that came mounted in an Eddie Bauer hiking pole that I use on the county hiking trails near home.

maybe I'm just being paranoid, after hearing how quickly some of the button compasses degrade, but I'm thinking I'd give each one a check for accuracy before I added them to any kits or gear stashes.

Let me explain about the accuracy check a moment. I don't mean to compare them to another compass I think should be accurate. I mean to compare it to a known direction. Sun rises in the east and sets in the west, for my area I know which way is north, it's a fairly quick and simple thing to take each button compass and test it.

This is the thing about these gadgets. One almost always has a "general sense of direction," even on the water (wave set, wind) in fog. When you pull out the compass, you generally need a more precise determination. On one occasion, I needed to differentiate between 40 and 20 degrees, something a bit tricky with a tiny little button thingy....

There are lots ways of orienting,many of which are less susceptible to error than a compass. Just think of all the many ways a compass, any compass, can give an inaccurate reading.

Here I must disagree. We have a lot of forrest in my country. Very easy to get lost. And hard to tell any direction when the sun is covered by clouds. Here the wrist compass comes handy.

Also when in an unfamiliar city. A few times I have come out of the metro station in Stockholm and did not have clue about directions. Well that is, until a look on the wrist compass solved the problem.

And with the suunto wrist compass it is possible to take readings with 5 degrees accuracy.

The Suunto wrist compass is a good compass, but it's not a button.

I also disagree with the idea that I always have a sense of direction. When I travel the windy roads to Tahoe and get out of the car, I find that north is often in the opposite direction that I feel like it is. Even after checking a compass, I still don't feel the north. It's a humbling feeling. If I'm the navigator of the group, I will have to check a compass regularly.

People relying on their internal sense is probably why people sometimes get horribly lost.

I wasn't very clear. I am not talking for an "internal sense of direction." What I am talking about is a sense of direction based on clues like sunrise/sunset, orientation of the street grid, topography, and the like. I agree that dense vegetation cover and unfamiliar urban terrain can render direction finding difficult.

But in terrain with any kind of distinctive features, maintaining orientation is quite easy. I use a compass about a hundred times more often than on land.

Even though I rarely use a compass, I almost always carry one, because you never know. I just make sure that it is a really good one.

Thanks everyone for the feedback so far.

I should have stated in my original post, that my main intention for use of a button compass was for quick general direction in big and/or unfamiliar cities (I used to travel 45-50 weeks per year) and woodlands (as backup).

In some of the larger cities, buildings will block and/or reflect the sun, making it difficult to tell direction quickly.

While I'm in relatively flat and deforested central Ohio now, eastern part of the state where I grew up is still quite green and has a lot of hills (foothills of the Appalachians) and it can be tough to get a bearing from the sun at times as it may be blocked by a hill or obscured by overcast skies.

One thing about Ohio, while it is relatively safe from most major natural disasters (knock on wood), I think many of you would be surprised how grey and overcast it is here, especially Fall through Spring, and more-so in the mid-latitude part of this state. We can go weeks where we may be lucky to get an hour total of the sun being clearly visibly in a day, and sometimes that's an hour or two per week.

I've had friends move south (Fla./Ga.) because they couldn't handle they seemingly continual grey skies here. As the DW and I get older, it's finally to get to us too. Looking forward to a day when we can at least turn into snowbirds.

yes indeed. don't get me wrong, I am not advocating a button compass as a primary compass, just a back up, when for some reason your primary gear and compass have been compromised [insert your favorite survival scenario here] and a general sense of direction is all you need (the river runs north to south, and I am east of the river, so if i travel in a westerly direction I will eventually run into it).

I found the little compasses on zipper or key fobs useful.
Usually they have a small inaccurate thermometer with them. The point I like about them is they can be clipped to a zipper, a belt loop, or to the inside of a pack.

The button compasses that are just by themselves tended to get lost on me but that does not stop me from having a few scattered around.

I still keep an eye out for those small round button compasses that are attached to disposable products like cans of bug spray.
Usually they are really bad quality though sometimes they are a bit better than you would expect.
They are easily separated from the packaging before you dispose of the empty containers.

Sometimes it is better to have a poor compass than no compass at all.

Another test is to turn the compass on its side, vertically, and then turn it about the vertical axis, and then lay it flat again so it has to find north from scratch. If it swings around quickly and confidently, then it's still strongly magnetised and pivoting OK. The slower it is, the weaker and less reliable. Do this more than once and check the result is the same each time.

You can use this to test compasses in a shop when deciding which/whether to buy, and you can use it in the field even if you don't know where north is. Obviously, if you do know where north is, you should verify that's what the compass is indicating, but in practise if it strongly indicates a direction at all, it's probably due to magnetism so it's probably north. (It might be south if the magnetism gets reversed, but that's not a likely failure mode unless someone is playing a trick on you.)

For me it's often the opposite. I'll find the street, or a fence, or even a stream, but I won't know which way to walk along it without a compass. So the compass gives me rough orientation and topography gives me exact direction. (Using the sun is great, but you can't rely on being able to see it in the UK.)

Well, this is partly about how much preparation you get. If you know in advance you are going to need orientation, then you can look around and decide on landmarks - and you should also take a better compass than a button. An every-day-carry button compass is for when you find yourself geographically embarrassed unexpectedly.

Good ones tend to be bulkier. There's a trade-off on how much bulk to allow for a tool that you don't expect to use. This started with the Watch thread, and part of why I like to wear a watch with a built-in compass is that the compass feature adds no bulk and yet is always with me. If I didn't have that and EDC'd a compass instead, it would need to be a very small one. Preferably a "really good one" within that constraint, which is where this thread started.

For urban travelling, I've tried a bunch of different types and I've settled on using those cheap carabiner type compasses that you can pick up for about a dollar. The more expensive name brand button compasses didn't seem last any longer, so I figured it's easier to just replace them regularly. They lose direction every so often, I have a bunch of them and just do a quick check before I leave on a trip.

When you're in an unfamiliar city, all you really need is to know is a very general direction when exiting a subway, or which direction to orient a street map. Even if the cheap compass fails, it's usually just a minor inconvenience, not a life threatening situation.

While hiking on established trails, the carabiner compass is usually enough to let me know which direction to head. Only when going off trail will I pull out a normal compass for better accuracy, but even that's rare because if it's a planned excursion I'll probably have a GPS.

Since a few people have mentioned compasses in a city, I can't say I have needed a compass in a city. There are always plenty of people to ask "which way is A Street" or whatever. I enjoy taking advantage of the reason to interact with people anyway.

button compasses are a great last-ditch survival tool, in principle. mostly made worthless because the people who make them go CHEAP. if anybody truly knows a GOOD RELIABLE button compass, please post!!

Pete

Alright, I did a search and found the one that someone on this forum recommended: the Tru-Nord compass. From the website, it looks like quality stuff that can adjust for declination. However, I have no personal experience with it.

http://www.trunord.com/about.html

compass capsules
http://www.suncompany.net/prodList.php?subCat=20


wrist, zipper,etc compasses
http://www.suncompany.net/prodList.php?subCat=3