thumb on the scale at airport check-in

A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: I'm off for a fairly long trip in October and i have to take a fair
: amount of luggage with me, i just bought some decent digital scales
: so i could try and remain low on weight. Out of interest i thought
: i'd start by weighing one of my guitars in its case. Usually when
: weighed at the airport it comes out at 8 or 8.1 Kg but on my own
: scales it comes out at 6.9 Kg, thats fifteen quid or thereabouts.

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

==== j a c k at c a m p i n . m e . u k === http://www.campin.me.uk ====
Jack Campin, 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland == mob 07800 739 557
CD-ROMs and free stuff: Scottish music, food intolerance, and Mac logic fonts
****** I killfile Google posts - email me if you want to be whitelisted ******

On Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:40:05 +0100, Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:
A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: I'm off for a fairly long trip in October and i have to take a fair
: amount of luggage with me, i just bought some decent digital scales
: so i could try and remain low on weight. Out of interest i thought
: i'd start by weighing one of my guitars in its case. Usually when
: weighed at the airport it comes out at 8 or 8.1 Kg but on my own
: scales it comes out at 6.9 Kg, thats fifteen quid or thereabouts.

Checking in anything that can break from ten story fall is insane.
I'm surprised a guitar can ever arrive in one piece. My experience
with electronics is that anything with a circuit board inside will be
destroyed even if packed between clothing.

If I had a guitar worth anything, I'd ship it or take it as a carry-on.

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

It's a great idea if you don't mind missing your flight and spending
the day locked in a tiny room.

Airport workers don't respond to logic and will not be able to fathom
the concept that the weight read by their scale should have any
correlation to any other scales. They only know what their particular
scale reads and if you don't like it then you can just go and ****
yourself. Or they'll call security who will help with that process.

The other day I tried to check in with a 54 lb bag and a 43 lb bag. They
wanted nearly $100 for the overage and of course couldn't fathom that
the average was below their limit. Fine. Opened both bags. Pulled
some clothing out of one bag and stuffed it in the other so that they
both weighed below 50 lbs. Good thing I did that. The plane might
have crashed otherwise. Meanwhile the couple behind me are at least
200lbs overweight between the two of them.

"AZ Nomad" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:40:05 +0100, Jack Campin - bogus address
wrote:
A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: I'm off for a fairly long trip in October and i have to take a fair
: amount of luggage with me, i just bought some decent digital scales
: so i could try and remain low on weight. Out of interest i thought
: i'd start by weighing one of my guitars in its case. Usually when
: weighed at the airport it comes out at 8 or 8.1 Kg but on my own
: scales it comes out at 6.9 Kg, thats fifteen quid or thereabouts.

My money would be on the airport scales, since you've had 8Kg consistently
from several of them, and only 7Kg once from your scales.

BTW how did you balance the guitar on your scales? I find things either fall
over or obscure the readout. Or did you weigh yourself with and without the
guitar?


Checking in anything that can break from ten story fall is insane.
I'm surprised a guitar can ever arrive in one piece. My experience
with electronics is that anything with a circuit board inside will be
destroyed even if packed between clothing.

If I had a guitar worth anything, I'd ship it or take it as a carry-on.

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

It's a great idea if you don't mind missing your flight and spending
the day locked in a tiny room.

Best to try it some day when you're not flying. Unused checkout desks often
had the scales still operative so it was possible to try them out
discreetly.

Airport workers don't respond to logic and will not be able to fathom
the concept that the weight read by their scale should have any
correlation to any other scales. They only know what their particular
scale reads and if you don't like it then you can just go and ****
yourself. Or they'll call security who will help with that process.

The other day I tried to check in with a 54 lb bag and a 43 lb bag. They
wanted nearly $100 for the overage and of course couldn't fathom that
the average was below their limit. Fine. Opened both bags. Pulled
some clothing out of one bag and stuffed it in the other so that they
both weighed below 50 lbs. Good thing I did that. The plane might
have crashed otherwise.

It won't crash but it means the baggage personnel are less likely to do
their backs in if they know that no one piece of luggage will be more than
50lbs or so.

Meanwhile the couple behind me are at least
200lbs overweight between the two of them.

What matters is the average weight of all passengers. I'm well below average
weight (for a man) but it doesn't bother me that I pay the same as someone
twice my weight, or I only use half my checked allowance. The airlines know
all these statistics.

--
Bart

Some people would comment about anything.

"Jack Campin - bogus address" a écrit dans le
message de ...
A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: I'm off for a fairly long trip in October and i have to take a fair
: amount of luggage with me, i just bought some decent digital scales
: so i could try and remain low on weight. Out of interest i thought
: i'd start by weighing one of my guitars in its case. Usually when
: weighed at the airport it comes out at 8 or 8.1 Kg but on my own
: scales it comes out at 6.9 Kg, thats fifteen quid or thereabouts.

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

==== j a c k at c a m p i n . m e . u k === http://www.campin.me.uk
====
Jack Campin, 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland == mob 07800 739
557
CD-ROMs and free stuff: Scottish music, food intolerance, and Mac logic
fonts
****** I killfile Google posts - email me if you want to be whitelisted
******

On Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:36:35 GMT, bartc wrote:

What matters is the average weight of all passengers. I'm well below average
weight (for a man) but it doesn't bother me that I pay the same as someone
twice my weight, or I only use half my checked allowance. The airlines know
all these statistics.

They don't know that 43+54 50+50

On Aug 6, 8:40*pm, Jack Campin - bogus address
wrote:
A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: I'm off for a fairly long trip in October and i have to take a fair
: amount of luggage with me, i just bought some decent digital scales
: so i could try and remain low on weight. Out of interest i thought
: i'd start by weighing one of my guitars in its case. Usually when
: weighed at the airport it comes out at 8 or 8.1 Kg but on my own
: scales it comes out at 6.9 Kg, thats fifteen quid or thereabouts.

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

==== j a c k *at *c a m p i n . m e . u k *=== *http://www.campin.me.uk ====
Jack Campin, 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland == mob 07800 739 557
CD-ROMs and free stuff: *Scottish music, food intolerance, and Mac logic fonts
****** I killfile Google posts - email me if you want to be whitelisted ******

Ah, personal scales. I wanted to check the scales before going to the
airport. After nearly 2 weeks of doing feck all but eating, sleeping
and a bit of driving 'round I expected to be heavier, like last year
when I put on nearly 12kgs. Imagine my surprise to find I had not only
not put on any weight, but lost 5kgs. Herself was was even happier
with her results.
So I weighed the case and it said 15.5kgs and off I went to the car.
On returning for the next one I was surprised that it felt even
heavier than at the beginning of the travels despite having off
loaded all the booze and Belgian chocolates and yet not having
replaced them with anything.
So when the scales said 18.2kgs I became suspicious and decided to re-
weigh myself.
Suddenly I had gained nearly 3kgs on the earlier weight. I re-weighed
the case, but no difference ; Then I tried myself again and I had
gained 4 kgs on my normal weight;
Since the case weight didn't change (well, not much) I popped it into
the boot next to the other one. Then out of curiosity returned to re-
weigh myself again and found I had gained yet another 2 kgs.

Off to the airport. There's a scales at Dublin airport other than the
check-in desk ones and there the 15.5 one became 18.8kgs, which made
sense because by then we had transferred some things from the big case
into the smaller one but now 18.2 had shifted in weight up to
nearly 26kgs. ????
Then by the time it got wheeled 'round to the check in desk it was
27kgs.

On the bright side, the several pieces of 'Belleek' survived.
(delicate chinaorcelain)

"Martin" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:40:05 +0100, Jack Campin - bogus address
wrote:

A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: I'm off for a fairly long trip in October and i have to take a fair
: amount of luggage with me, i just bought some decent digital scales
: so i could try and remain low on weight. Out of interest i thought
: i'd start by weighing one of my guitars in its case. Usually when
: weighed at the airport it comes out at 8 or 8.1 Kg but on my own
: scales it comes out at 6.9 Kg, thats fifteen quid or thereabouts.

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

Take into account the airline can tell you sod off.


Ryanair wouldn't tell you to sod off. They would greet you with open arms
and would charge you £170 per flight to check-in a 20kg bag or £260 to
checck-in a 23kg bag.
--
JohnT

In Jack Campin -
bogus address wrote:

A post from a well-known Scottish musician on the Footstompin forum:

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

In the US, airport scales are subject to state inspection as are any
other scales used in commerce.

--
Bert Hyman St. Paul, MN

Jack Campin - bogus address wrote:

: Does anyone know when or how often the scales at airport check in
: are calibrated and whether or not i can legally challenge their
: weigh in?

Comments, anyone?

In the US, commercial scales used for commerce almost always need to be
certified by a local weights & measurements agency. I can't say that I've ever
seen the certification sticker on an airline counter scale through. Now that
it's become more common for airlines to start charging for overweight luggage,
I'll bet they fall under those same laws. Would be interesting to see if they
are complying.

JohnT wrote:

Take into account the airline can tell you sod off.


Ryanair wouldn't tell you to sod off. They would greet you with open
arms and would charge you £170 per flight to check-in a 20kg bag or £260
to checck-in a 23kg bag.

I had a visit from some friends from the Netherlands last year. They
are seasoned travellers and pack light. They had one suitcase for the
two of them. They picked up some wine while they were here and their
single suitcase was about 2 kg over the limit so they were charged
something like $50 for the extra weight. Their luggage was still a hell
of a lot lighter than what they would have been allowed for two bags.
Special handling?? I doubt it.