For more information, visit ktoolinternational.com.

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Read the full script below:

Hi, this is Eric with TechShop and another edition of Tool Showcase.

You’ve heard me talk plenty of times about how we as technicians use sight, smell, touch and hearing every time we diagnose a car. And some of our most important tools are those that enhance our natural senses.

Even better are those that create senses we never had to start with, such as the ability to see temperature, and that’s exactly what a thermal imaging camera does.

Thermal imaging cameras aren’t new, but they’re not all created equal, so we jumped at the chance to check out the KTI-XD275 Portable Thermal Camera from K-Tool International.

The KTI-XD275 is one of the recent additions to K-Tool’s XD line, which is focused on affordable and efficient tools for the professional technician.

So, let’s take a look at it and see what we’ve got. There’s the unit itself, a wrist strap, a USB-C cable, a wall adapter and a 16-Gig micro-SD card, plus it’s got a boss on the bottom that looks like standard thread for most tripods. That could be pretty handy.

The features include a 2.4-inch color LCD display, a 25 Hertz frame rate, temperature range of negative four to 752 degrees Fahrenheit, trigger operated laser pointer and image capture, six color palettes, an eight-plus hour operating time, two-hour fast charge and easy data transfer.

It also features 120 x 90 infrared resolution, meaning it instantly displays radiometric data of 10,800 pixels.

Ok, I have to be honest I had to look that one up. A radiometer is simply a device that measures the intensity of radiant energy or heat by means of ultraviolet light or infrared. As they say, you learn something new every day.

So, I powered it up to look at the functions and under the menu you can find the photo gallery as well as a long list of settings and adjustments for temperature range, emissivity, color palette, center point, temperature alarm, screen brightness, date, time and lots more!

Thermal imagers are great for multiple professions, but they’re worth their weight in gold for an auto technician. Let’s have some fun.

I couldn’t resist so at first, I had to see how well my coffee mug was working. Then I threw it in my car so I could try it out after a drive, and here’s more of the images.

This first one is under the hood, and it’s neat because you can see the cooling system outlets on the end of the cylinder head, but you can also see how well the insulated engine cover keeps the heat in the engine. These are great for cooling system diagnostics.

Then I checked the outlet temperatures of the A/C. I had 50 degrees in the center, 57.6 on the right and 57.0 on the left. Think how handy these could be, especially for dual climate control concerns.

A thermal imager is a great way to confirm brake problems, and these shots show you the front and rear brakes on my car. Notice also here that with the center point function turned on, you can see how it displays the center point temperature in the upper left, but still automatically finds and displays the hottest spot.

There’s really almost an endless list of what you can diagnose with one of these, but some other common uses are wheel bearings, seat heaters, exhaust systems and even electrical problems like parasitic battery drain.

These are great tools to have, and while I was looking at my car, my furry friends came over to visit. I thought I better check them for Covid, and good news, they were both ok.

I got all of these images in a matter of seconds and with the ability to store the images and easily transfer them to your computer, this is also a valuable resource for sharing your diagnosis with your customer.

So that’s it for today. The KTI-XD275 Thermal Imaging Camera. If you’d like to know more about this or more of their other XD-series tools, visit ktoolinternational.com.

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Thanks for watching TechShop’s Tool Showcase. I’ll see you next time.