Mystery Sphere?

Hi all, apologies if this is in the wrong section!
I work in a pub, and one of my regulars brought in an item he purchased from an antiques dealer. Neither the dealer or my regular know what it is!
I'm absolutely fascinated by it, and would love to know what it is or its purpose.
Photo was too large so uploaded to imgur, link below.
That was the only photo I took, hopefully someone can recognise it from that
https://imgur.com/a/SlzVj

 

Cant help,but here ya go,some wont click on links.

 

Idle guess: maybe some kind of measuring device? Roll it over a surface, count the revolutions sort of thing? The sphere looks professional, but the lettering doesn't.

 

Looks like two Greek words but so far they don't make sense to me. If u could get clearer photo of those words without reflections etc I'll try again.

Object is a wood ball with copper wire cursor. Might be some kind of math teaching aid? Isn't more than about 30 years old in any case.

 

Welcome!
Intriguing!
I LOVE it!
Might want it.

 

That looks awfully familiar. Bedarned if I can remember from where. Something to do with vector analysis ... I think. You need a hard core math geek for this one. I just posted the Imgur link to a friend of mine whose husband fits the bill.

 

All I can tell you is the writing is greek, but the object looks to be recent (within the last 50 years )

 

That's pretty cool.......but.....after a few pints...& some lively discussion....I'm amazed the lads in the pub didn't take a cricket bat to the little blighter !!!

 

Maybe...light wavelengths...

 

@evelyb30
I think you are on the right tract.
I have no idea what a vector is. Definitely don't understand this link.

https://faculty.math.illinois.edu/~ash/LinearAlg/415Ch2.pdf

 

A vector is usually a directional factor.
Those odd little structures you see around the US that have what looks a little like a bowling pin on top is a Vector. It's what aircraft fly by. They use them to plot their position by.
Usually small aircraft I think any more.

 

Here's another one
https://books.google.com/books?id=R...78DUgQ6AEIWzAE#v=onepage&q=UV Bc V- N&f=false

You get some really weird responses when you put in the letters on the ball.
https://www.google.com/search?q=UV+Bc+V-+N&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

 

I was thinking some sort of teaching aid for spherical trigonometry.

 

Those bowling pins are VORs, not vectors. They send specific radio signals for navigation - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VHF_omnidirectional_range

Vectors are a mathematical term for a combination of direction and distance. It's about relative position. Some of that n-space pure maths can get painful.

I don't think it's trig, af. I've a feeling it's related to calculus: I'm dragging this out of long lost memory, but there's something called vector calculus of spheres. It's around calculating vectors in a spherical environment using calculus, but I've forgotten how you do it.

 

OH yes!!!!
Vortacs!
Took ground school long ago now.
~
But don't they vector aircraft?

 

Anything that moves has a vector, as it has both direction and speed. In the case of an aircraft, they'll be told to fly at a compass heading and a speed. That's a vector, but it's also velocity.

 

Ok.
Essentially an X Y axis computation.

 

And altitude, just to make life interesting. Gotta avoid eating those trees. Trees do props and jet intakes no good at all.

 

These are all such interesting theories thankyou! I honestly wasn't expecting to get so many responses haha.

 

hey , at least there's a sphere there......