Moisture content meters

[PeteC]

Anyone have any recommendations for a quality moisture content meters? The most bang for the buck that is. ;)Thanks for any suggestions. God Bless

[aaron]

My suggestion is to forget moisture meters. Firstly, they are notoriously unreliable. secondly, you can determine equilibrium moisture content based on relative humidity and temperature. Just buy a temp/ humidity sensor, put it in your wood drying area and you can calculate the wood's moisture content. The only situation where this doesn't really work is if you are trying to "quick dry" a stave, and cannot wait until after it has reached equilibrium. Am i making sense here? What state are you in?, what woods do you work with? and do you have the TBB books?

[aaron]

texas i see. A dry part?

[PeteC]

No,East Texas. My problem is not with excess humidity as one might guess for this part of the state,but , for checking a number of roughed out staves that I seasoned in my hay barn since Feb. '11,and hopefully preventing any more breakage. I had 2 osage staves in a row break on the tiller board. I've done without a meter for 14 years,and a lot of bows,but never had problems on this end of the humidity spectrum,due to excessive heat and drought. Thanks for responding. God Bless

[UserNameTaken]

I've got one from General Tool.  I think I paid about $40 for it & it seem to work.

[Pat B]

The pin type moisture meters only measure between the pins and not in the center of the stave. I gave my moisture meter to Justin Snyder so he could check if his wood was too dry. Utah gets pretty dry.  I haven't missed not having a moisture meter. I can tell by feel and sound if a stave is dry enough.

[loefflerchuck]

What Aaron was saying. I used to have streaks of exploding bows. I got a RH sensor for about 10$ and found the humidity in our home got below 20% from our ac in the summer and heat in the winter. Got a humidifier in my mancave to keep it at 50% rh. No more broken bows unless I really make a mistake

[George Tsoukalas]

I use mine all the time. I have a Mini Ligno. It is the pin type and yes, it is true that it only measures the surface but there is a way to get around that. You just keep checking as you work the stave into a bow. When you get a reading over 10% stop and let the wood dry. Jawge

[Gus]

You can also drive Brads or small finishing nails into your stave at sacrificial point in the wood.
Touch your tester's pins to the nails to read deeper into the wood.

Per the instructions that came with my tester from Lee Valley.

-gus

[iowabow]

My meter works great but I use it to determine if i will be working the stave with a sealant or not. Here is the deal. When I cut my wood I leave it long. This will give you some wood to cut in half. Testing the center it will help you know a couple of things. I found that wood with a reading 13% will check if you are working in the sun on a windy day at 30% humidity. So as we chased the ring we sealed it.  Below 10 I never had a check. I think it is another tool that will give you a heads up to a potently problem. IMO it is not a tool that will tell you if it is ok tiller. In Iowa beadman does a simple test. He weights the stave (after it has been floor tillered) each day when it stops dropping wt it is good to go.