Experimentation #2

All right, so I think everybody who has been around me knows about my little situation with the scale. The past three weeks, my scale has been consistently saying 176.5 lbs to 177 lbs. No matter what.

I decided to do an experiment. I stepped on the scale. 177 lbs.
Okay. Whatever.
I stepped off, allowed it to turn off, and grabbed an extra large can of hairspray, and a pack of rags. I would have guestimated them to be around 3 lbs total. At least.
I stepped on the scale. Not to be fooled, my scale said 178 lbs.
Hmm. There should be a higher raise in poundage than that, right? (Click the following link to continue post.)



Again, I got off of the scale and let it turn off, and I set down the items I was holding.
I stepped back on, expecting the scale to tell me I was 177 lbs. again. Then, I would maybe think it was okay.
Nope. 176 lbs. So...the scale is telling me that by setting down all of that stuff and getting back on the scale, I lost a pound in those ten seconds?

Uh, okay. Sure.

I proceeded to repeat this with many large objects.
The highest my scale would go was 179 lbs.,despite the fact that I had a lot of stuff in my arms. And then I couldn't get it to go lower than 177 lbs. again.

I also weighed with clothes on/off. Weights never varied more than a pound. Which...don't clothes usually add at least 3 pounds on? I was wearing jeans, a cami, bra, t-shirt, and socks. That's got to be worth more than a pound.

Intriguing. I know it has user settings so that it'll remember height, gender, body type, etc. However, I wasn't really sure why it would be keeping my weight so consistent over the past three weeks, when I know I've been decreasing steadily. I've been pushing it harder and harder during my workouts, watching every little thing that goes into my mouth, etc.
All to no avail.
I was getting very discouraged, because despite the fact that I felt my body telling me I was making progress, the scale would have nothing of it.

I brought up the issue to my boyfriend, and he told me he has thought that scale was a little wacky for a while. He did his own experiments and came up with similar results as me. In fact, a few weeks ago, there was a twelve pound difference between our scale and my mom's at her house. I would be fine if it was like...3 pounds. That's probably right, but 12?! Geez.

After my little experiment, I decided to do some research. For the bathroom scale I purchased, I found a few people complaining of the same problems. A couple of theories speculated on the fact that perhaps Taylor has put some sort of memory chip in their scale that remembers the number formerly on the scale and does something with it, especially if it's been used in the last few seconds. Perhaps this would increase people's confidence in the accuracy? I don't know. It just seems fishy.

So, I decided to do a little more research and find a scale with good ratings. I found a Weight Watchers scale from Wal-Mart that was highly rated as far as comparisons with doctor's office scales, precision, and consistency. It has a current/last/start/goal weight tracker for four users. And I came to find it was on sale.
Deal.

I weighed myself when I got home. First with clothes on. 175.4. Okay, yeah, scales can vary.

Then came the ultimate test. If you recall, my theory was that my clothes should weigh around 3 lbs.
Clothes came off.
I hopped on.

172.4 lbs.

Score!

So...the happy end to the story is that I've jumped down a little and exceeded my goal weight for the week.
I'm not saying all Taylor scales are bad. Maybe mine just got...stuck? It's a very confusing one to run, and it seems a little too consistent for believability.

Now, I'm stuck with an extra scale I don't even want. And I know I threw out the box. I can't remember if I have the warranty papers or not. It's got a lifetime warranty. Anyone know what the stipulations are for those? I'm curious as to if I can get my money back for lack of satisfaction.
Boo.

Oh well. Hopefully this shall be the happy ending.