A Good Scale?

I'm looking to buy a new scale. I don't have much money (maybe 150 bucks) and was wondering if anyone out there could make a recommendation. I do silver printing,mixing my own developers and toners as well as many alternative processes. I want it to be digital and relatively small. Anyone help?

William

try www.balances.com as they have scales in all price ranges

lee\c

had a typo on the url.

Check out www.balances.com.

I use a Toyo 250 pocket scale, which has 250g capacity, and it cost me around $40. If you make large prints (requiring larger quantities of chemicals) or mix your own fixer, you might want a scale with 500g capacity. On the occasions that I need more than around 200g of something, I just measure in two batches.

To measure a large quantity with a small scale, just put a paper or plastic cup on the scale and zero it out. For smaller quantities, I usually just use a slip of paper to hold the powdered chemical.

i have something along this line

http://www.pulseinstruments.net/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=2955

will double check the exact brand, etc when i go into the lab on tues and get back to you if you like?

Whatever you buy get something with a fine enough resolution for whatever you'll be weighing. If you need to weigh in tenths of grams then buy a scale that measures down to hundredths. *edit* Sorry, I guess that doesn't really answer your question.

I bought a cheap Escali pocket scale via an eBay seller about a year ago. My model is accurate to 0.05g with a capacity of 100g (or so the manual claims). If I had to do it again, I'd get two scales: One with an accuracy of 0.01g (and possibly a lower capacity than 100g) and another with 1g accuracy and a capacity greater than 100g. This combination, in inexpensive scales, would cost half or so what you've budgeted and will give you the ability to measure small quantities when required (such as the tiny amounts of phenidone that are required in most phenidone-based recipes) as well as large quantities (of sodium thiosulfate for fixers, for instance) with less precision. Since you're unlikely to need 0.01g precision when measuring 150g of sodium thiosulfate, this compromise is a good one, IMHO.

I'm by no means a scale expert, but what I gathered when I did my research was that when you buy an expensive name-brand scale, you get two things compared to buying a cheap "semi-generic" scale like mine: (1) A combination of improved accuracy with higher capacity and (2) better long-term reliability. Buying two cheap scales, as I've suggested, gets you the former characteristic. Personally, I'm willing to live with the probability that I'll have to buy a new scale sooner with a cheap scale vs. a name-brand scale. At the time I bought mine, I wasn't sure I'd be mixing my own chemistry in the long term, so it made sense to economize today rather than sink money into something I might not be using in a year. Even if you know you're in it for the long run, there's something to be said for saving money today, but it's your call whether to do that or pay more up-front and be less likely to have to pay again in a couple of years.

Look for Ohaus, RCBS, Lee, or Speer reloading scales at the local gun store. These scales will start at $25 or so, and even the bottom end will weigh in 1/10 grain (1/10 grain is about 6 mg); mine, 25+ years old, still works perfectly (after at least a dozen moves). The bottom end type are limited in how much they'll weigh; mine is one of these and goes to 510 grains, max, which is not quite 35 grams, but it's easy to repeat a weighing, so you can set the scale, fill the pan to balance, dump the pan into another container, and fill again. They often aren't marked in grams, but only grains (well, they might have markings in grams these days, or a conversion chart), but it's easy to convert at 15.4 grains per gram (I do the arithmetic in my head, most of the time).

And if you only spend, say, $50 on your scale, you'll have $100 more for chemicals, film, etc.

ineffablething said:

I'm looking to buy a new scale. I don't have much money (maybe 150 bucks) and was wondering if anyone out there could make a recommendation. I do silver printing,mixing my own developers and toners as well as many alternative processes. I want it to be digital and relatively small. Anyone help?

William

Click to expand...

Get a use baby scale for the big stuff--- should cost under $5 USD--- and get a surplus lab balance for the small stuff. Any precision balance that sells for $150 USD new is not worth bothering with. They are perhaps "readable" on their digital displays to miligrams, if not even fractions, but they are generally not precise to milligrams nor even moderately linear. Their highly resolved digital displays are misleading and provide a false feeling of accuracy and exactness. For most photochemicals formulations, on the fortunate side, one does not need much precision so one can often get away with using them but I see little point beyond ritualistic incantation and self deception. Good digital analytical lab balances are very specialized and expensive instruments. Its like looking to the plastic microscope kits in the toy department for clinical lab work or--- to relate to photography--- a disposable camera for glossy studio work.

Don't worry about the range. You will never probably need precision for much anything over 50 grams. For chemicals such as sulfite you honestly don't even need a balance and can just figure things out by "scoops" but baby scales are convienient. They are more than accurate enough for any small scale chemical application you are proned to encounter.

There is one aspect of electronic scales that I hadn't known about, until I was given one with a new manufacturing process.

Electronic scales have a timeout feature, which may be as short as 30 seconds, the scales I was given with the other equipment has this timeout feature which can be annoying.

Basically what happens is that the scales shut down if they detect no movement, up or down, in 30 seconds. I found this out when the phone rang whilst weighing something. By the time I had quickly told my friend I was weighing something, put the phone down, I turned back to the scales just in time to see the LCD fade away.

As a result I still weigh my photographic chemicals on a quad balance beam which I've had around 19 years, doesn't need batteries, can stay ready during a long or short phone call, doesn't take any longer realistically than the electronic version, but best of all, it is an analogue set-up!

Electronic scales that I've used, (three all up) seem to also have a problem in detecting minute additions of weight. I found after adding a small amount of weight, the scales didn't alter the reading. By nudging the scales with a finger, to add a fair bit of comparative weight, the scales then reflected the additional material.

This may, or may not be, a difference between extremely cheap and laboratory standard electronic scales. Maybe people who work in labs could enlighten?

Mick.

ineffablething said:

I'm looking to buy a new scale. I don't have much
money (maybe 150 bucks) and was wondering if
anyone out there could make a recommendation.
William

Click to expand...

I'll recommend the most recent model of the
Acculab I've now in use nearly five years; the
V-200. Resolution and accuracy 0.01 gram, 200
gram capacity, price under $150. Dan

Ebay is full of digital scales for almost nothing.

I went the high low way. A small gem scale. It's accuracy [not the resolution] is fairly high. I added a big postal scale for the big stuff. To compare the postal scale is accurate to something like 5 grams. The gem scale is accurate to either 1/10 or 1/100 [I forget] grams. So small stuff that needs the accuracy I use the small scale for. When I need to weigh 500 grams of something I use the big scale.

From looking at some of the expensive scales in the local shops I get the feeling many are made in the same factory the cheap no-name scales are made in.

Mick Fagan said:

There is one aspect of electronic scales that I hadn't known about, until I was given one with a new manufacturing process.

Electronic scales have a timeout feature, which may be as short as 30 seconds, the scales I was given with the other equipment has this timeout feature which can be annoying.

[...]

Electronic scales that I've used, (three all up) seem to also have a problem in detecting minute additions of weight. I found after adding a small amount of weight, the scales didn't alter the reading. By nudging the scales with a finger, to add a fair bit of comparative weight, the scales then reflected the additional material.

This may, or may not be, a difference between extremely cheap and laboratory standard electronic scales. Maybe people who work in labs could enlighten?

Mick.

Click to expand...

My Toyo 250 pocket scale doesn't have these problems ($40 at www.balances.com). It times out after 15 minutes or so, and I can add minute amounts, and they register on the scale. I also have 100 g calibration weight so I can check the calibration occasionally, and it seems to hold prety well, and seems to be linear. It has a parts counting feature, which seems to work accurately, and it would not work accurately if the scale were not linear.

Thanks for all the good advice and links.

William