Par Meter

[UFreefer]

I was looking into getting a Par Meter and ran into a thread where a guy said this:

If you have a good quality multi-meter you can purchase the SQ-120 quantum
sensor from Apogee instruments

The sensor which costs $139.00, measures Milli-volts which you just multiply the
reading on your Multi-meter by 5 to give you a very accurate par reading without
having to spend hundreds more on the actual Quantum meter.

Has anyone done this?

I assume the sensor has a Positive, Negative and Ground. Woud you just use alligator clamps to attach to the multimeter probes? or I guess you could solder your own jacks.

 

[revhtree]

I have never seen this either. Please keep us updated!

 

[UFreefer]

Found apogee's manual that basically confirms it. The sensors come with the conversion printed right on the cable.
http://www.apogeeinstruments.com/manuals/SQ-100_300manual.pdf
They have a sensor calibrated for metal halide light, sunlight and flourescent, not really sure which we need.

 

[UFreefer]

There are 3 different calibration models for both sunlight and electric that we need to choose too....

 

[davework]

I have this setup, works great

 

[davework]

Plus a good MultiMeter is much more useful than the par meter

 

[UFreefer]

Agreed! Did you solder the + and - to jacks or just clamp them onto the mulimeter probes? Can we just cap the ground wire?

 

[thewackyreefer]

If you're looking for a PAR meter why not take a look at the Seneye? It has a PAR meter and tons of other functionality. Hasn't been used by many (as far as I've seen) but from what I can tell it's accurate.

 

[davework]

I bought the sq-110 sensor

 

[davework]

Here's some pics. I bought two banana type connectors from radio shack. Easy.

 

[davework]

Ground wire is left as-is. I didn't cut it off or cap it. The only thing I would recommend is a good holder. I had some extra acrylic lying around and it's worked out great. If anyone needs a strip of it to do the same, let me know.

 

[davework]

These were the plugs:

LINK

 

[UFreefer]

Thanks for the link!