We discuss an astrometric timing effect on data analysis of continuous
gravitational waves from rapidly rotating isolated neutron stars. Special
attention is directed to the possibility of determining their distances by
measuring the curvature of the wave fronts. We predict that if continuous
gravitational waves from an unknown neutron star with a stable rotation are
detected around 1kHz within 1/3yr by initial LIGO detectors and the ellipticity
parameter epsilon is smaller than 10^{-6}, the distance r to the source can be
estimated with relative error \Delta r/r of \sim 10% by using the broad band
configuration of advanced LIGO detectors over 3 years. By combining the
observed amplitude of the waves with the estimated distance, information on the
parameter ϵ can be obtained purely through gravitational wave
measurements.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure, to appear in PR