If you need accuracy, you need to allow for surface finish.

Look up IR emmissivity if you want to bore yourself to tears.

Or, if you have a gun already, put electrical tape on something shiny and shoot it up close, on and off the tape. That difference you will see is because of emmissivity.

Generally not enough to worry about, unless you’re a thermographer.

Yes, and no. You can measure body temp, but it’s going to be surface temperature, not internal temp. Not so useful — you’d probably have a surface temp of about 100 degrees F when your internal temp was around 104-106.

As for checking from a distance — well, certainly not with this one. Most gun-shaped ones have a field of view (FoV) of around 10:1 — so for every 10″ they have a 1″ spot that they’re measuring the temperature of.

This thing’s FoV is 1:1. Yup, that’s right — try to take the temperature of something a mere 2′ away and it’s taking the average temp of a 2 FOOT diameter circle.

Spend another $10 and get one worth a darn.

The thing with this cheap unit for sale is the battery. Button batteries are expensive and I doubt they will last long. It will be dead when you really need it to work.

Also, get a temp sensor with a laser. A laser really helps know what you are pointing at. You’d be surprised how bad your accuracy can be with these things when you don’t have a laser.

F.