Who writes this

Jean-Benoit Buisson

Every page on this site is written and signed by one person. This page says who, how the judgements are reached, and — just as importantly — what he is not.

How I got here

I started keeping notes because of a mismatch I kept meeting, on instrument after instrument and in every family here: why is the number printed on the box never the number stamped on the part? A caliper is advertised on the 0.01 mm it displays, which is its resolution, while the accuracy the maker publishes separately is two or three times looser. A thermal camera is sold on an image size that was produced by upscaling a much smaller detector. A stud detector quotes one depth on the box when the manual quotes a different depth for every material. Every page I found while looking for an answer had the same shape — a ranked list, a score out of ten, an affiliate button, and not one figure I could check against the manual.

That is the whole subject. Measuring tools rarely fail outright; they quietly report something that is not what you asked. A distance meter set to measure from its back edge while pressed against a wall by its front is wrong by the length of its own body, every time, without complaining. An infrared thermometer at 12:1 held a metre away averages a ten-centimetre circle. A tool gets returned because it was bought against the wrong one of two numbers that both appear on the box. None of that is on the front of it, and all of it decides whether a reading means anything.

So this is the page I wanted and could not find. I read what manufacturers publish, I check every product reference market by market, I follow what things actually cost rather than what they are listed at, and I say plainly when a figure is not published at all. That last part matters more than it sounds: most of the disappointment here comes from a number nobody printed.

I keep notes — the honest specification of each family, the place where the manual contradicts the sales page, which thread fits which tripod, and the buying mistake each category invites. This site is those notes, put in order, in five languages, because the same question is asked in French, German, Spanish and Italian and gets a far worse answer in four of them.

I am not a metrologist, an electrician or a surveyor, and I do not pretend to be. What I can do is read carefully, compare honestly, report every manufacturer figure with its source, and tell you which number the maker left out.

What this site covers

Everything listed here is taken from the catalogue of this site, and each entry links to its own page. When the catalogue changes, this list changes with it. It is a list of what is covered — not a list of what I own.

What I care about

Three things, and they shape every page here. The number that gets quoted is usually the wrong one — a caliper sold on its display resolution rather than on the accuracy published beside it, a thermal camera sold on an upscaled image rather than on its detector, a detector sold on its deepest figure rather than on the one for the material in front of you. What the thing costs over three years decides more than what it costs today — leads perish, fuses blow, probes get stood on, and a cell left in a meter over winter costs more than the meter. And the thing that matters most is rarely on the specification sheet at all: whether the reading you took is the reading you think you took.

What I am not

I am not a metrologist, an electrician or a surveyor. I hold no qualification in any of them, I have never worked for a manufacturer or for a retailer, and nothing here rests on any professional title. This site describes a product — its construction, its materials, its published specifications — and stops there. In particular, every accuracy figure, measurement category, laser class and detection depth on this site is reported from the manufacturer with its source named, and never derived by me. Working on a live installation is a safety matter: nothing here replaces the manufacturer's own instructions or the rules that apply where you live, and where a job belongs to a qualified person, the page says so instead of talking you through it. Where a maker marks a product CAT III 600 V or laser class 2, I report that the maker states it — I am not a testing body, and no instrument described here is presented as calibrated or as fit for a legal, regulatory or evidential measurement. If you are looking for someone whose authority comes from a job title, this is not that site; what each judgement rests on is stated on the page it appears on, and you can read how this site reaches a verdict in full.

How I work

Every figure names its source: a manufacturer specification, a manual, a standard, or the weight of long-term owner reports.
No price, product reference or specification is ever invented. Where a figure is missing, the field is left empty and the gap is stated on the page.
Product references are verified against Amazon before publication, per market. Where a model is not sold in your country, you are sent to a local search rather than to a page that does not exist.
Where the cheap option wins, the page says the cheap option wins — and where the honest answer is a €4 fuse and a new set of leads rather than a new meter, it says that instead.

Why this site exists

Because measuring tools are sold on the wrong numbers. A display resolution is printed where an accuracy figure belongs. An upscaled image size is printed where a detector resolution belongs. A single detection depth is printed where a table of depths belongs. And the parts treated as afterthoughts — the leads, the fuse, the probe, the battery — are usually what actually decides whether the instrument works when you reach for it.

There is also a part of this that is not about buying anything. Most instruments that get replaced were not broken; a cell leaked into the battery compartment over a winter, a lead cracked at the strain relief, a fuse blew on the current range and nobody had written down the four euros that would have fixed it. A meter that "stopped working", a laser that will not hold a level, a caliper that reads a few hundredths off because nobody zeroed it. Those problems are cheap to fix and almost never written down. That is the subject a page full of new equipment is guaranteed to skip. It is not skipped here.

Correcting me

If something here is wrong, tell me and I will fix it and date the correction on the page. Write to [email protected].

Jean-Benoit Buisson · Montrollet, France

Prices quoted in these summaries are dated readings. The live price is shown next to each product.