Product Review
Kestrel 3000
Roland Leong, Managing Editor
Bob Dylan sang,in Subterranean Homesick Blues,"You don't need
a
weather man To know which way the wind blows" What he says may
be
true, but for everything else related to weather, you need to
measure
something.
You can take your weather data with the Kestrel 3000. The Kestrel
3000, (named after the smallest American falcon,) is a battery
powered
device the size of a small cell phone that measures:
temperature, wind chill, relative humidity, heat index, dewpoint
temperature, current wind speed, maximum 3 second gust, average
wind
speed.
Wind speed has different selectable scales, For example, wind
speed
can be displayed in Beaufort force, knots, meters/second,
kilometers/hour, miles/hour, or feet/minute. Temperature can be
displayed in either centigrade or fahrenheit.
The Kestrel 3000 is waterproof to 1 meter and it floats. The battery
is a CR2032 coin cell battery that can be found in Radio Shack
or
other retailers. Estimated battery life is 250 hours or approximately
25,000 readings.
The unit itself is 4.8 x 1.7 x 0.6 in, comes with a protective
slip
case and lanyard. The Kestrel 3000 is shock resistant, tested
by
dropping from a height of 6 ft.
Accuracy for Temperature and Wind Chill +- 1.0 C; relative humidity
+- 3%; dew point temperature +- 2 C; heat index +- 3 C.
Min temp -20 F (-29 C) Max temp 158 F (70 C)
The Kestrel 3000 is very easy to use, reading the instruction
manual
was not necessary to use the unit.
The unit automatically turns off after 30 minutes of no button
presses.
The impeller that spins to measure wind speed is user replaceable.
Warranty is one year, full parts and labor except for the battery.
Units subject to abuse, improper maintenance, etc. are not covered.
SR has seen one or two other portable handheld weather data devices,
but the others don't have the feature set that the Kestrel 3000
does.
There is also the Kestrel 1000, and the Kestrel 2000, that have
fewer
functions. The Kestrel 4000 has more functions than the Kestrel
3000,
but his larger and heavier. SR believes the Kestrel 3000 is the
best
combination of function and size. If we needed to have more functions,
we'd have the Kestrel 4000.
We found that when taking the Kestel 3000 from indoors to outdoors,
the device took a few seconds to acclimate to the temperature
change
before settling on a reading. The device has a temperature accuracy
of
+- 1.0 C so one can expect the digital readout to vary a bit even
in
static temperature conditions. For example, a temperature reading
of
60 degress F may vary to 59 or 61, or more considering a 1 degree
C
change is equivalent to approximately 2 degrees F. Note also that
windchill is defined for temperatures below 50 degrees F and wind
speeds greater than 3 mph, so the Windchill reading won't change
unless the stated parameters are met.
SR found that when taking the Kestel 3000 from indoors to outdoors,
the Relative Humidity reading can take 5 minutes or more to stabilize
in certain situations. We took the Kestrel 3000 from indoors to
an
outdoor track meet in wind and rain. It took every bit of 5-10
minutes
for the humidity reading to stabilize in the high 90's.
SR will be using the Kestrel 3000 to record weather data when
it does
any testing where weather is a significant consideration.
The Kestrel 3000 lists for $179.00. Purchase and additional
information can be found at; www.nkhome.com