IR Thermometer to balance radiators/central heating system

[jonnyw]

From a suggestion in my previous thread, I'm planning to balance my central heating system in the near future.

I've read the FAQ here, and thought I'd get an IR thermometer to make life easier, but it seems some require areas larger than a pipe to take the temperature from.

Can anyone recommend a budget-friendly IR thermometer that's up to the task of taking reading from radiator pipes?

 

[ianmcd]

yes forget them and get a contact thermostat set up

 

[ericmark]

Still not set mine up, I have a tommee tippee which was bought for medical use, I had intended to use that, but had boiler problems so waiting until sure they are cured.

Mothers house I used the reading from the TRV head, it current over target closed a little and if under opened a little, after of course it had been running for some time. With the modulating gas boiler this worked spot on, not sure how it will work with oil boiler?

 

[jonnyw]

Is it worth getting a pair of these then: https://www.brannan.co.uk/clip-on-pipe-thermometer-0-to-120-c-f

Unbranded ones are half the price on eBay, but I guess they wouldn't be accurate. No idea if brannan is a decent brand or not???

 

[Ian Clarke]

I got IR Thermostat and its in the drawer, Found the variations on readings pointing at same pipe, 10 to 15 degrees made it impossible to use to balance system, it could read 68 one sec then 55 the next, so trying to go between end of the radiator to balance the lock shield was impossible

 

[Ian Clarke]

Do you know when you start balancing them - youve opened up all lockshields fully and start at first to have it quarter turn, if at that point if had 8 rads, would 2-8 still be open fully, then you move to rad 2 and make that 3 quarter turn, would rads 3-8 still be fully open at that point ?

 

[ianmcd]

Something like this would be best for you, the ones I use hace jump lead like connectors for the probes but we use them all the time , something like this with some insulating tape would do for your needs

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dual-Cha...385419?hash=item595775294b:g:bvgAAOSwWelfXzbj

 

[MJN]

I use an ETI TN1 IR thermometer and find it excellent - very repeatable, accurate and of course instant response given the lack of heat transfer.

Note two important aspects relating to their use though - they effectively read in a 1:1 'cone' and so for something narrow like a 15mm pipe you want to be right up to it (certainly within 15mm) so the pipe fills the full field of view. Easy to do in practice - just hold it against the pipe like you would with a contact thermometer and if there's an LED/laser target (there isn't on the TN1 - usually more prevalent on the 'gun' type ones) ignore it as the parallax error at close distances would render it useless. The other point is emissivity given that it is reading IR radiation from the target - this varies between different surfaces/materials even when they're at the same temperature. The TN1, like most IR thermometers, is calibrated for an emissivity of 0.95 and black PVC insulation tape is practically exactly this also so you should put a piece on the pipes being measured first for ultimate accuracy. Attempts to read the temperature of bare metals in particular is futile with an IR thermometer as it will lead to very poor (inaccurate, inconsistent) results.

I've also got a dual probe Uni-T temperature meter with some K-type sensors and that too works well in terms of accuracy but it is nowhere near as easy/quick to use as the IR thermometer for radiator balancing given the need to mess around with the clamps and the vulnerability of the probes. There might be better methods of attachment available but I've never looked as the IR thermometer does everything I need.

Edit: It looks like the TN1 is unfortunately no longer available, and with no personal experience of others I'm not in a position to recommend an alternative. If you were nearby I'd have been happy to let you borrow it.

 

[chris911sc]

+1 @MJN
I thought my IR thermometer (Fluke) was rubbish.....until i read the instruction how to set it up and learn how to use it.

 

[jonnyw]

Something like this would be best for you, the ones I use hace jump lead like connectors for the probes but we use them all the time , something like this with some insulating tape would do for your needs

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dual-Cha...385419?hash=item595775294b:g:bvgAAOSwWelfXzbj

Cheers . I'll give those a try. I guess temperature accuracy is less important than the difference between the two probes (which given it's the same device is hopefully more accurate)