Degrees, Minutes, Seconds

Date: 01/25/2001 at 16:21:21
From: Karl Mcfadden
Subject: Degrees minutes and seconds

How do I convert degrees in decimal to degrees in minutes and seconds?

Date: 01/25/2001 at 16:54:30
From: Doctor Peterson
Subject: Re: Degrees minutes and seconds

Hi, Karl.

To convert degrees to minutes, you multiply by 60, and likewise to 
convert minutes to seconds.

In this case, you only want to convert the decimal part at each step 
to the smaller unit.

So, for example, to convert 34.56 degrees to DMS, we first pull off 
the whole part (34 degrees) and then convert 0.56 degrees to minutes 
by multiplying:

    0.56 deg * 60 min/deg = 33.6 min

Now we pull off the whole part (33 min), and convert 0.6 minutes to 
seconds:

    0.6 min * 60 sec/min = 36 sec

The answer is therefore 34 deg 33 min 36 sec.

- Doctor Peterson, The Math Forum
  http://mathforum.org/dr.math/