Properly Using your Applied Ballistics Kestrel in the Summer Heat.
Similar to all of your shooting equipment, your Kestrel with Applied Ballistics will be subjected to solar heating outdoors and steps should be taken to ensure accurate environmental measurements are captured by your device. To demonstrate the effects of solar heating, I placed one Kestrel in a wind vane mount in the sun. I also placed a Kestrel in the shade in a wind vane mount as well. The Kestrel in direct sunlight read 11 degrees higher after 20 minutes and finally reached a temperature of 122 degrees. Comparatively, the Kestrel in the shade only reached 94 degrees – the actual air temperature outside. Amazingly, this test was not performed during the hottest part of the day, and the day I ran this happened to be the coolest we have had in several weeks. This further goes to show the large discrepancy that you may see when capturing readings without proper air flow.
Keeping in mind that even when the weather sensor is exposed to a free air stream, other factors can also influence the temperature reading. If you are firing from an unorthodox location such as a hot roof, a non-insulated building, the deck of a ship, on top of or inside a vehicle, then the heat radiated from these surfaces will also increase your temperature readings. Improperly setting your environmental updates to continually capture temperature readings will result in a firing solution that is incorrect.
In these situations, what can be done to ensure proper temperature readings? Our recommended solution is to go to AB Mode and then enter the Environmental screen. Next, take the unit by the lanyard and spin it or otherwise wave the unit freely through the air while Update is set to “Yes.” After several seconds (greater than 10), simply press the right button turn live readings off and lock in your temperature, pressure, and humidity readings. Once it is locked you can also manually change the environmental factors. If it has been a while or you have moved to a new firing location and you want to update these factors, simply switch it back to yes and repeat this process – we recommend doing this approximately every 30 minutes.
August 13, 2015, 09:45 AM
