Digital scale recommenations

Discussion in 'General Precious Metals Discussion' started by dollars, Dec 5, 2021.

  1. dollars

    dollars Active Member Silver Stacker

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    Hi Forum members

    Interested in any thoughts or recommendations for digital scale to weigh individual coins and coin lots to help I verify coins

    What do use yourself ?

    Ie accuracy required, if calibration weights are necessary, good/great deals on offer or anything else to be aware and watch out for.

    Thank you

    Cheer$
     
  2. barneyrubble

    barneyrubble Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    For this kind of thing I use an On-Balance CH-500. It does the job.

    Have not used calibration weights, but I did check coin weight spec's for ones I owned and they came out accurately.
     
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  3. Skyrocket

    Skyrocket Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    I got $10 scales from ebay. El cheap from China but they do the job
     
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  4. Golden ChipMunk

    Golden ChipMunk Well-Known Member

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    Most of these are handy. It depend on the capacity.
    For pocket size it will do the job and the modes can be change in a few buttons.
    The price are reasonble to own a few for the field. ( One in the car , home, desk ....etc etc )
     
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  5. Alloy

    Alloy Active Member

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    There don't seem to be stable brands or manufacturers if you buy them on Amazon or eBay. They're all random Chinese brands, and there might be something like a 10:1 ratio of brand models to actual products, such that the same scale is sold under many different names.

    The one I bought on Amazon US a few years back is called the WAOAW W-01-50 Digital Milligram Scale. It's no longer available. The name WAOAW is typical of the strange arbitrary strings we see for the Chinese brands. That said, the scale is good and I have no complaints. It came with a calibration weight.

    I would get a 50 gram calibration weight, at the F1 or better certification level.

    You might want a 50 gram scale for high precision weighing of 1 troy ounce bullion. A troy ounce is about 31.1 grams. Then a heavier scale for the 2 or 10 ounce bullion, kilo bars, etc.
     
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  6. vos

    vos Member

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    Buy a cheap scale and spend money on calibration weights. Most scales are shit out of the box.

    Don't use coins to calibrate because they are frequently over or under weight. (Actually 19th century coins are usually perfect within a few milligrams. 20th century we apparently lost our ability to measure.)

    If not buying weights then the best cheap scales are pill/tablet weighing scales. They can usually weigh up to 50 grams with 1mg precision.
     
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  7. Darwin

    Darwin Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Precision Pocket Scale WD121 is one set that will show very close (within 0.01g) of what you want to weigh - if you're smarter than me and you can figure out how to operate the thing...

    The Smarscale SH-500 is also accurate to 100th of a gram (0.01g) and is a lot easier to operate when you're ... um ... when you're me.
    This one can be set to the mode of ozt as well, so you don't need to calculate the equivalent.
    The first may also have ozt, but as we clarified earlier, I'm not exactly clever...
     
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  8. heartastack

    heartastack Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Solid advice.
    Something like this, but that's a 10mg resolution.
    https://www.jaycar.com.au/200g-mini...31351cff00a44fb737028c8ca042e2&sort=relevance
     
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  9. REDBACK

    REDBACK Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Buy 3 different budget brands then weigh the same item.They will all be different lol
     
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  10. Golden ChipMunk

    Golden ChipMunk Well-Known Member

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    Have you tried???

    You would be surprise .....

    I have about 4 x ....
     
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  11. REDBACK

    REDBACK Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Yes lol, otherwise I wouldn't have made the statement.
    One example, where I was at a persons house weighing a bag full of nuggets and I had two scales and he had 2, totalling 4.
    All of them were registering different weights, so we settled on the scale close to the average.
    Now theses weights were different in the .00 range which makes a difference when you have larger weight at stake.
    So when it matters in $$$ scale price, quality & accurecy make a difference.
    Most dealers would have scales priced in the $500-$5,000 range for a reason
    You will also notice Chip I didn't say don't buy the cheaper brands.For non business Tx they are fine I still use them, but you 'Get what you pay for'.
     
    Last edited: Jan 11, 2022
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  12. Golden ChipMunk

    Golden ChipMunk Well-Known Member

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    "Most dealers would have scales priced in the $500-$5,000 range for a reason"
    or Any Merchants.... that do trading.... or any devices that measure commercially.... another example Fuel Pumps

    These are subject to be Tested by a board on occasionally and received Merit stickers; even they are $5000 they still need to be calibrated as times goes by..... just incase they get dropped or get knocked over... and lost it accuracy.

    The "Al Cheapo" is just used as a Guideline ( Never meant to be as accuracy measurement ) so it doesn't matter.
    Over the years, I've pick up a few fakey with my scales... and 1 oz..... which is below or over..... 31.103 gram
    That's the first test , the second is magnetic test...

    Since precious is sold by fixed weight and we know each one ounce is one ounce.... We don't need to weight again.
    ( It is only a Test for Fakey ) by weight , magnetic and sound....

     
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  13. heartastack

    heartastack Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Yeah when you get into commercial sale (retail/wholesale/B2B) you are legally bound by weights and measures laws. Therefore as a business you will pay $$ for scales that are built like tanks and have on-demand customer service + replacement scales when needed (especially in the food industry where they get muck on them all day and still measure perfectly). I've seen scales calibrated every 20 mins in some factories so that if anything was misaligned you would only need to quarantine 20 mins worth of production. In the worst case I've seen a week's worth of stock on hold because they kept producing after scales either broke down or were not calibrated properly, then a customer found underweights). If Coles or WW find underweights by the time it hits their shelves you are absolutely screwed. The fines and lawsuits can be severe (basically treating it as theft from the consumer), but overweight is also not desirable for yield loss and in the case of food misrepresenting the nutritional panel.

    I still believe some shitty but working scales and good calibration weights (and understanding them) is the way to go to not waste money.

    The comment about weights fluctuating compared to 'the good old days' is a good one. Again, not familiar with industries outside of food but I'd wager that the Average Quantity System has been widely implemented due to improving manufacturing efficiencies.
    https://www.industry.gov.au/data-an...y-system-in-australia/average-quantity-system
     
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  14. REDBACK

    REDBACK Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    Your making points off topic I have no contention with, but by all means knock yourself out.
     
  15. alor

    alor Well-Known Member Silver Stacker

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    that is not a scale :D
     

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