Moisture meter

[Bruno of NH]

Is this meter any good ?

[petefrom bearswamp]

I have 2 and they seem to be OK
They both give the same reading on the same board.

[GeneWengert-WoodDoc]

The meter is indeed fairly accurate.  For $100, it will tell you a rough idea of the MC.

The “problem” with this meter is the resolution.  If the “8” light is on, this mean the MC is 7.0 to 9.0% MC.  And then the “10” light means 9.0% to 11.0% MC.  Or does “8” mean 8 to 10?  Also, you have to make species and temperature corrections manually or mentally.  You need the instruction booklet to make corrections.

With the short needles and the lack of a plug to plug in a hammer probe, you cannot measure core MC on most pieces of lumber.  That is, you are measuring surface MC.

So, I think their more expensive meters and probes are more useful for many people.

[Southside]

I have a SDM pinless meter from the Lignomat folks, more expensive, but it seems to do a very good job, it has 1/4" and 3/4" depth options and is species specific.