When you cook a recipe or walk through long distances, we often come across measurements, right! Today’s measurements play an essential role in various fields like engineering, research, medicine, and what not! But what strikes your mind when you think of the term “measurement”? Yes, the scales. Most of us use scales whether to check a body height, to construct a building, or else to rate the product scaling from 1 to 10 in terms of quality. In practice, scales are used to assign an object with numbers called as measurement.

In general, there are two types of scales called as a digital scale and an analogue scale (non-digital scale). While considering measurement, accuracy is the most important aspect to find the numerical value of any object. This is because; accuracy inspects the quality of the instrument to gain desired results. Well, are you eager to know which scale is more accurate? Then, this article will help you to explore the same.

The following are some of the factors that determine the accuracy of the digital and analogue scales.

Pressure Springs:

Pressure springs are the main component in analogue scales as they provide consistency in weighing any objects. But there are no pressure springs in the case of digital scales. In recent times, research was made to test the accuracy of the bathroom scales. These scales are 70 per cent digital and 30 per cent analogue. Using 6 calibrated weights, researchers experimented 61 bathroom scales. And, as a result, digital scales accurately weighed the loads when compared to analogue scales. On average, there was a difference of approximately 0.05kg between the scales.

Regular Usage:

Regular usage of the scales can result in very low accuracy. As a result, recalibration is required in analogue scales; as they tend to lose the balance. However, digital scales undergo malfunction in circuitry resulting in loss of accuracy. At high temperatures, even the new scales may not produce accurate measurements. Therefore, every scale must withstand high temperatures. Moreover, if a scale is subjected to any stress and vibration, it can lose accuracy. Thus, it is advisable to clean the weighing equipment to produce accurate measurements.

Trade-off:

Analogue scales cannot be precise and possess trade-off. Trade-off means losing an aspect such as quality or quantity to gain other aspects. Well, in the case of a digital scale, precision plays an important role. This precision can cause a slight variation in the percentage of error in every reading. Note that, even a low-cost digital scale can produce inaccurate measurements.

Hope, you all understood the usage of accuracy in both digital and non-digital scales. Both scales perform the task of measurement; with some pros and cons. Most of the people think that digital scales tend to be accurate. But the adverse fact is that consistency is proven useless in digital scales when you weigh. Thus, both scales tend to be accurate. But depending on the requirement, it’s up to you to choose the right one.

Author's Bio: 

I'm Blogger.