Difference in mechanical switch versus electronic switch
Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 10:15 am
I have a IAC timer with a electronic starting switch and I have always been suspicious if it was accurate. Seemed like the same time came up too often.
So I decided to also connect our NewBold timer. It has a mechanical timer. What I found was the NewBold timer was about .0150 slower than the IAC timer. But not super consistant. It would fluctuate as much as a 100th of a second..
I attribute this to the longer time for the mechanical switch to trigger versus the electronic switch.
Does 150th of a second sound reasonable?
This experiment has made me more comfortable in the IAC timer. But I also believe a mechanical switch is not accurate enough to really determine who wins a race when the winning times are within 100th of a second which would be a typical situtation.
So I decided to also connect our NewBold timer. It has a mechanical timer. What I found was the NewBold timer was about .0150 slower than the IAC timer. But not super consistant. It would fluctuate as much as a 100th of a second..
I attribute this to the longer time for the mechanical switch to trigger versus the electronic switch.
Does 150th of a second sound reasonable?
This experiment has made me more comfortable in the IAC timer. But I also believe a mechanical switch is not accurate enough to really determine who wins a race when the winning times are within 100th of a second which would be a typical situtation.