IR home leak imaging

Well, the cost of the imagers has come down. The Extech/FLIR line has one below $2K now. I keep trying to come up with a good enough excuse to get one ...

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Rich Webb     Norfolk, VA

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gist

jpan2

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rds]

bos]

I don't see how you expect IR devices to find roof leaks on your house. IR devices are commonly used to find areas of poor thermal insulation.

Thanks. The idea is to throw water and see where it goes. Insulation damage is insulation dmamage, water or wind.

I called the expert, who I respect a lot, and he basically offered to look at it at his hourly rate. His expertise is probably worth more than the equipment, but I have to compare that cost to the cost of just adding a new layer of siding (with energy stimulus). And,worse of all, I have a co-owner who is reluctant to do anything.

- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist

---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}--- [Homeland Security means private firearms not lazy obstructive guards] [Urb sprawl confounds terror] [Phooey on GUI: Windows for subprime Bimbos]

=3D -

gist

jpan2

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rds]

bos]

How is water going to tell you where the leaks are. It will just disappear into the house, not show up on IR imaging?

What about a dye that is colorful when wet and white when dry, so it could detect leaks in wallks and even grout because the leak stays wet longer than the rest?

That cool IR cam Rich posted really got my engineering interest alerted!

PS, water keeps a leak damp and has a different temperature signature than the rest of the wall. But that is why a day and night IR picture helps track the different temperature changes.

In by Rich Webb on Sun, 04 Jul 2010 18:18:56 -0400 we perused:

*+-*+-> *+->I knew someone who got some used fancy oilfield devices and imaged *+->houses to find leaks using not only infrared but some pretty fancy *+->math to compare how the images changed as the temperature changed *+->during the day to night cycle. I gotta wonder if this has advanced *+->much in the decade since.

*+-Well, the cost of the imagers has come down. The Extech/FLIR line has

*+-one below $2K now. I keep trying to come up with a good enough excuse to *+-get one ...

*+-

- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist

---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}--- [Homeland Security means private firearms not lazy obstructive guards] [Urb sprawl confounds terror] [Phooey on GUI: Windows for subprime Bimbos]

Rit dye.

David A. Smith

If you want to experiment with it yourself, consider an appropriate infared filter for your camera.

Photographic film and silicon image sensors do not respond to low temperature thermal infrared. Usually over 99.98% of that is of wavelengths longer than 3,000 namometers. Film that responds much past

1,000 nanometers is about as common as hairy eggs. Silicon image sensors only go out to about 1100 nm, faintly to maybe 1300 nm.

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 - Don Klipstein (don@misty.com)