I’ve been thinking of investing in a set of digital scales to support my fanatical weight-concious building program. In the past I’ve made do with a set of spring-based kitchen scales. I don’t know much about these things so would be interested in others thoughts and experiences. My thinking is that that whatever I choose needs to be sufficiently accurate that I am not embarrased when a finished boats gets officially measured. It should be calibrated down to a gram or so, but have sufficent range and size to weigh a finished and rigged IOM (4kg/8.8lbs) being the heaviest class I’m like to be involved in racing for the foreseeable future.
Muzza,
I also became very interested in accurately measuring weight & bought a digital scale on eBay a couple years ago. It was a smaller unit with a max weight of 11# (5000 g) & a claimed accuracy of 1g. I seem to recall paying about $65, although checking now it appears that prices have come down. I’ve been real happy with it & it’s still using the original 9v battery. I would suggest you keep the weight range as low as you can, because if all things else are of equal quality, it will be more accurate than, say, a 75# postal scale. As with anything else on eBay, check that the seller has a good feedback record.
Regards,
Bill
Guys - contact your local Pitney Bowes office and ask about trade-in scales. We replaced our mailing system and new scale came with it - nothing wrong with the old one (digital) except the accounting interface. Had a 15 lb. max limit on it - and I’m not sure if they kept in stock for parts/replacement of someone else who had old system, or if they just dumped them. I have a meeting in a couple of weeks with my rep - and I will ask him about the old stuff that still might work. If I have any good news, I will post.
Another source of supply - your local Sheriff’s Office. They confiscate quite a lot of the beam type scales during drug raids, and they might provide opportunity for public to purchase via auction. Ours usually sells for about $3.00 each. They usually are stolen from high school labs, the cops get them and sometimes give them back to high school if marked. A rather strange “circle” of ownership. Call the local office and ask to speak to “Property Officer”. He/she can let you know if they have anything and how they dispose of them - ahhhhh - best to explain to them “Why” you want one. Reduces the number of nightime “blue light” visits …:scared:
Keep in mind the difference between resolution and accuracy. I’d certainly suggest you get scales which can resolve to one gram if you can afford it. Mine resolve to 5 gram and, curiously enough, it isn’t satisfactory for IOM work! But measuring a keel and reading, say, 2495 gm doesn’t mean this is accurate. On mine, a keel which reads 2495 actually weighs around 2455. From time to time I stroll over to the Wolfson Unit and use their five 1kg certified calibration weights to construct a translation spreadsheet for my scales. The translation curve (reading to actual) depends upon temperature, and is non-linear, being something of a second-order polynomial… So buying scales with good resolution is only half the story – certified calibration weights is the other half!
Please visit this site , all type of weighting balances are available : http://www.balances.lu/index.html
delivery everywhere
Personally purchased precision balance JKD 250 res. 0.05g
Claudio
thanks for the link