Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 March 2016
The procedures used to reduce the Hipparcos data in both FAST and NDAC consortia follow the so-called three step procedure described in 1976 by L. Lindegren (unpublished). It consists in a first place to treat data collected during a few hours and, since the sky scanning is only slowly drifting, deduce the abscissae of observed stars on a given mean great circle, called the reference great circle (RGC). The object of this presentation is to discuss the quality of the results obtained at this stage of the reduction. The results presented here are, we believe, representative of the 3000 or so great circle reductions that shall be made during the full data treatment.