On Mon, 8 May 2017 11:46:44 -0400, rickman wrote:

On 5/8/2017 11:36 AM, wrote:
On Monday, May 8, 2017 at 10:47:44 AM UTC-4, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
but is a feature of the 981D, which seems to be unavailable.

Like all such cheap devices, the laser pointer is misaligned. One
thing I like about it is that it does NOT have a rubberized paint
coating on the handle, and will therefore not self destruct like the
Sears version, where the rubberized paint turned to sticky goo.

Being ordinarily cheap, I nonetheless tend to buy quality tools (I hate to spend money, but I hate having to spend twice even more). I use a Raytek Raynger ST, and according to it's label, it was built in 2000. I can't believe I've owned this that long. It's a 12:1 and it does have some sort of rubberized grip, but it's still pliable with no sign of returning to it's original chemical state.

I use this often and never had a problem with it. If it ever dies, I'll get another Raytek assuming it's still made somewhere other than China (this one is U.S. made).

One thing a lot of people don't realize is that these work great, but won't work on reflective surfaces.

It's not just reflective surfaces. The calibration of these things
depends on the emissivity of the object being measured. Metallic
surfaces are so low that they won't work at all, in fact, they reflect
IR from the environment and so appear to read a valid number when they
are just mimicking the environment. Other surfaces will read a lower
temperature than accurate because their emissivity is lower than the
unit is calibrated for.

I can put mine up to my ear canal and read 96 °F.
I had to figure out what y IR thermomometer would measure accurately
by comparing measurements with an accurate thermometer that makes
contact with the object or fluid being measured. I then amused myself
for a little while measuring the temp of some aluminum surfaces. The
reflected IR that you mentioned had me wondering for a bit because the
temp indicated would change quite a bit depending on whether I was
measuring the IR from the gas stove flame being reflected from the
pot's surface into the IR sensor.
Eric