I'm very tempted given that I am in something of a "chicken and egg situation" when it comes to my doing electronics and fault-finding work on motherboards (usually within older PCs and laptops). I've not been able to go right down to component level easily when it comes to motherboard shorts and this will help me get there - at the same time, however, the PCs and laptops I repair are generally "common as muck" and I can usually pick up an entire new motherboard online for £10 or £20, so it then becomes a case of "how much is one's time worth"! But thank you for a very useful video, it has got me thinking! £120 for a thermal imaging character of this quality is "not to be sniffed at". And let me take this opportunity to wish you a very happy and prosperous New Year!
It's quite a useful tool to have around, not just for electronics. I've only been using them for a few months on my repair jobs but they do come in handy and get you looking in the right sorts of areas for faults. As you say it's then down to cost of replace against cost/time of repair. Happy New Year to you too!!
Good video, how would this camera fare for finding heat loss around the home? Cracks around the windows/doors, loft, aimed at the outside of the house etc?
I tried it on my house and it does show where the heat is escaping - at least the hotter areas on the walls, window frames, etc. where I guess hot air might be leaking out.
Does this camera have a way of merging the phones camera with the thermal camera? I just purchased a slightly more expensive stand alone thermal camera and Its been a bit of a mixed bag. It was around $180 (US) and has a larger (160X120 @ 25hz) sensor but its not exactly high quality. Its should have the ability to merge the thermal image/video with its onboard normal camera (like Flir MSX) but the latter is seemingly broken. It still gets the job done but I'm not totally sold on the accuracy. I also have a Flir one (very similar to what you have here) and can say with confidence that the user experience is much better than my newer one. I like the model you have here, I wonder how well it handles reflective or absorptive objects. I strongly believe we're about to see massive price drops with thermal cameras as Flir seems to have much more competition these days. It's really awesome to be able to see which piston isn't firing properly on an engine without taking it apart. I bet we'll see these as cheap household items in less than five years.
No. The app simply shows the phone camera view as a insert window on the app screen. As the cameras are not aligned the views are different. I guess you could use the extension cable and put the thermal camera beside the optical camera lens to get better alignment. I'm not an expert on these things but I know you can adjust some parameters for accuracy. On the reflective side it does seem to register the reflected image rather then the reflective object. Not sure if that's what you mean. I have seen some sub £50 versions of these cameras but not sure of the quality. I guess the internals will probably be much the same.
@@BytesNBits Thats still quite helpful even if the images aren't aligned. I have trouble seeing things like wires when using just the thermal sensor alone. I'll have to take a look at this model, seems like a pretty decent unit.
I haven't tried the Mini2 but I have another manufacturer with the higher resolution. To be honest for the majority of jobs the higher resolution doesn't make much difference. Yes you get higher res images and can see more detail, but for general temperature monitoring, even spotting the hot components either will work well. I'm sure there are certain situations where the higher res will make a difference but I haven't really come up against those as yet.
Dig out your old cellphone and charge it up. There's a thin clear plastic type layer on the camera's Objective Lens, (In Side), called a "Hot Block". It is an IR blocking filter. Remove it with pointed tweezers, and your cellphone camera becomes a fancy thermal imager. Simple! . . `Thought Everybody knew that, because it was realized way back 30 or so years ago.
Thermal imaging is FIR Far Infra Red (around 10 micron wavelength) and needs a specialized long wavelength sensor. The IR that your cellphone is filtering out is NIR Near Infra Red (around 1 micron wavelength). For reference the regular Optical band for phone CCD sensor is 0.3-0.8 micron wavelength.
That looks like a belated Christmas present to myself!
Great. You won't be disappointed.
RUclips algorithm knew it wanted this before I was aware of it myself.
Thank you for a good video.
Glad it was helpful!
I'm very tempted given that I am in something of a "chicken and egg situation" when it comes to my doing electronics and fault-finding work on motherboards (usually within older PCs and laptops).
I've not been able to go right down to component level easily when it comes to motherboard shorts and this will help me get there - at the same time, however, the PCs and laptops I repair are generally "common as muck" and I can usually pick up an entire new motherboard online for £10 or £20, so it then becomes a case of "how much is one's time worth"!
But thank you for a very useful video, it has got me thinking! £120 for a thermal imaging character of this quality is "not to be sniffed at".
And let me take this opportunity to wish you a very happy and prosperous New Year!
It's quite a useful tool to have around, not just for electronics. I've only been using them for a few months on my repair jobs but they do come in handy and get you looking in the right sorts of areas for faults. As you say it's then down to cost of replace against cost/time of repair.
Happy New Year to you too!!
Good video, how would this camera fare for finding heat loss around the home? Cracks around the windows/doors, loft, aimed at the outside of the house etc?
I tried it on my house and it does show where the heat is escaping - at least the hotter areas on the walls, window frames, etc. where I guess hot air might be leaking out.
Does this camera have a way of merging the phones camera with the thermal camera? I just purchased a slightly more expensive stand alone thermal camera and Its been a bit of a mixed bag. It was around $180 (US) and has a larger (160X120 @ 25hz) sensor but its not exactly high quality. Its should have the ability to merge the thermal image/video with its onboard normal camera (like Flir MSX) but the latter is seemingly broken. It still gets the job done but I'm not totally sold on the accuracy. I also have a Flir one (very similar to what you have here) and can say with confidence that the user experience is much better than my newer one. I like the model you have here, I wonder how well it handles reflective or absorptive objects. I strongly believe we're about to see massive price drops with thermal cameras as Flir seems to have much more competition these days. It's really awesome to be able to see which piston isn't firing properly on an engine without taking it apart. I bet we'll see these as cheap household items in less than five years.
No. The app simply shows the phone camera view as a insert window on the app screen. As the cameras are not aligned the views are different. I guess you could use the extension cable and put the thermal camera beside the optical camera lens to get better alignment.
I'm not an expert on these things but I know you can adjust some parameters for accuracy. On the reflective side it does seem to register the reflected image rather then the reflective object. Not sure if that's what you mean.
I have seen some sub £50 versions of these cameras but not sure of the quality. I guess the internals will probably be much the same.
@@BytesNBits Thats still quite helpful even if the images aren't aligned. I have trouble seeing things like wires when using just the thermal sensor alone. I'll have to take a look at this model, seems like a pretty decent unit.
This vs the mini 2, your thoughts?
I haven't tried the Mini2 but I have another manufacturer with the higher resolution.
To be honest for the majority of jobs the higher resolution doesn't make much difference. Yes you get higher res images and can see more detail, but for general temperature monitoring, even spotting the hot components either will work well. I'm sure there are certain situations where the higher res will make a difference but I haven't really come up against those as yet.
Dig out your old cellphone and charge it up. There's a thin clear plastic type layer on the camera's Objective Lens, (In Side), called a "Hot Block". It is an IR blocking filter. Remove it with pointed tweezers, and your cellphone camera becomes a fancy thermal imager. Simple! . . `Thought Everybody knew that, because it was realized way back 30 or so years ago.
I hadn't come across that. Thanks. Sounds like a project for a future video!!
Thermal imaging is FIR Far Infra Red (around 10 micron wavelength) and needs a specialized long wavelength sensor. The IR that your cellphone is filtering out is NIR Near Infra Red (around 1 micron wavelength). For reference the regular Optical band for phone CCD sensor is 0.3-0.8 micron wavelength.
@@gaitskell It works and it doesn't cost $10,00, OK? `Nit-Picking Jerk!