Go to Forum Home Building Design Thermal Imaging Cameras

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    • #31605
      Anonymous

        Anybody got any views or experience of the best Thermal Imaging cameras for community (ie parish/ ward) use?

      • #38310
        Nick Grant
        Participant

          You need to be a bit more specific!

          What do you want to achieve?

          A lot of skill and experience needed to use one and to correctly interpret the results.

          I have a 'cheap' one that is useful for tracking problems and for finding air leaks during blower door tests but it would be considered a toy by a building Thermographer.

          Nick

        • #38311
          Nick Grant
          Participant

            Too late for your deadline but not much to add. Expensive bit of kit to let people have a go and results need a lot of interpretation and knowledge about buildings to make use of. For uninsulated buildings you will mainly learn if the heating is used rather than much new about the U values and without insulation there will be no thermal bridges to spot!

            Sorry to be a wet blanket.

            More useful for new build or energy efficient refurb and for spotting defects but not a magic wand to determine energy use.

            Nick

          • #38312
            Paul Buckingham
            Participant

              From my experience, community groups carry out vast quantities of surveys within a short space of time by taking a couple of images of each house from the outside. I find that external images like this actually show very little of any real value, the best they are likely to achieve is raise an interest in thermal imaging. I have my own camera and use it to indicate missing insulation, draughts, etc, each survey usually takes at least an hour and I mainly work around the inside of the house which really shows up some scarey stuff!
              If you are looking to buy a community camera I would seriously think about what you are hoping to achieve with it, getting useful information takes time and needs a degree of skill to interpret what you see. If your community have time to spare to really look in depth at each building then I see no reason for not purchasing one, however if you are looking to carry out quantity surveys of whole streets, etc in a few evenings then the benefits probably do not justify the financial outlay.
              Generating interest in thermal imaging by hiring a camera for a week and then passing on the interest to a professional is probably a better way to go to produce some real energy saving advice and results.

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