When HN users recommended it
1 HN user recommended this in 2013, in one comment.
20072026
Each tall tick is one HN user's first recommendation. A short tick is the same user again. Click a tick to jump to the comment.
1 HN user recommended this in 2013, in one comment.
Each tall tick is one HN user's first recommendation. A short tick is the same user again. Click a tick to jump to the comment.
I got one of these (Fluke 62, http://www.amazon.com/Fluke-62-Mini-Infrared-Thermometer/dp/...) for $35 or so on sale.
You can get the same guts for $15 (http://www.amazon.com/Accuracy-Non-Contact-Infared-Temperatu...)
It tells you the surface temperature of whatever you point it at, and has a convenient laser for aiming. When cooking, I use it to see if a pain is hot enough yet (e.g. to sear meat), rather than relying on the "smoke point of various oils" test. You can also use it to see how close water is to a boil, although I'm not sure if it is measuring surface temperature, some slight penetration into the water, or the pan bottom (although, arguably, these should be fairly close in water).
It's also useful in something like a fusebox to find hot/overloaded circuits. It's essentially a 1x1 pixel themal imager, while a 100x100 thermal imager costs much more.
You still want a probe thermometer (for measuring meat internal temperature) such as http://amzn.com/B0000CF5MT, and if you have kids/sick people/etc., probably the internal-temperature kind (the ear/IR kind are the least gross).