Can someone tell me how reliable mechanical scales are...

Can someone tell me how reliable mechanical scales are? That's all I have right now and it says I've lost 5 pounds but it fluctuates quite dramatically, showing I've gained 5 pounds overnight in some cases. Should I get a digital scale? Or is the accuracy pretty much the same?

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you can see how weight distribution on the scale can change the value on the scale with a mechanical scale, and you can get electronic scales with (mediocre) body fat meters. beyond that, they're all about the same.

Water weight you dunce. Even if you lose a pound of fat you can appear heavier because the amount of fluids in your body can fluctuate 5 pounds or so daily. Sometimes more.

Digital scales are worse actually. Make sure you're weighing yourself at the same time of the day, preferably in the morning after you've gone to the bathroom and before you've eaten or drank anything. A glass of water can be a pound alone.

>buy mechanical scale with easily gotten to calibrator
>keep a small weight next to it
>calibrate it with the weight any time you feel it is off

this is why you only weigh yourself once a week. because your weight changes minute by minute as you eat and breath and shit and piss and sweat.

Shit I looked up the weight of water and didn't realise how heavy it was. A single gallon is over 8 pounds? Wtf. I drink a LOT of water and other liquids. I also eat a lot of fruits and vegetables which contain high amounts of water. Makes sense now. So I'm not making any progress whatsoever. Fuck this.

I don't care so much about the number on the scale though. I just want to know when I've lost or gained weight. Even if it's not calibrated correctly and I lose weight, it should still be less than it was before. That's why I was asking, because I wasn't sure if it was caused by other means or if mechanical scales can be shitty in the first place.

its probably correct, test it with water or potatoes or some shit

You're going to pass that water though, it doesn't matter if it adds 10 pounds as long as your body is going to work on your fat. I drink 6L on days I go to the gym, adds a stone but it doesn't matter. You want to lose FAT not just weight. Doesn't matter if you're carrying an extra stone of water, still progress

If you're a beginner and want to lose fat the best way to track progress is by getting a tape measure (a few bucks at a crafts store) and measure your waistline with your gut sucked in, neutral, and pushed out.

But at the end of the day if my weight is the same as yesterday, that means I haven't gained any weight from both extra fat or water.

Yes but weight doesn't just disappear from a single location, right? That's right callipers are used on different parts of the body. I can't seem to find callipers anywhere though.

...

Right, but there should be fairly steady fat loss around the waist.
Calipers aren't effective unless you have low body fat anyway.

Well I'm not obese. My BMI is 1 point in the "overweight" category. I was underweight about a year ago.

Calipers will probably be difficult for you to use accurately.
The waist measurement will give you plenty information to know that you're progressing.

ill give you some tips i use user

1. weight yourself in the morning after morning shit/piss but before you drink or eat anything. Generally should stop any fluctuation from varying amounts of food or water consumed from day to day.

2. only thing you want to keep in mind from a scale is that its going down if your cutting. mechanical scales can get thrown out of wack or something and even then scales dont tell you much

3. get a measuring tape and measure your navel. aslong as your waist size goes down you should be doing good

seconded also ive only ever heard good things about the navy calculator and how accurate it is

fitness.bizcalcs.com/Calculator.asp?Calc=Body-Fat-Navy

>it says I'm 12%
I wish. I can only barely see two of my abs while flexing under the right lighting on the night of a full moon.

double check your measurements units etc. kg not lbs cm not ft etc.

also if you're using measuring tape make sure no slack no sucking in gut measure neck at smallest point.

generally i add ~2%to play it safe

Lol americans
If you used fucking LITERS and KILOS like the rest of the fucking planet you could get a better notion of that. 1 L of water equals 1 KG in weight.

I live in Canada. We use both the imperial and metric system for different purposes. Weight ourselves in pounds, measure in feet (on small scales), but use kilometres, grams and litres in other cases. It's confusing.

Well your actual weight (minus water, food, etc) isn't going to change much from one day to another. The most you should lose a week is two pounds. That means every day you lose a little over a quarter of a pound. I agree with the other user's point of just wanting the scales' general trajectory to be down. There are just so many variables including water intake, water retention, scales inaccuracy etc that I have learned not to trust them too much. But if overall, it's telling me I'm down a bit, I'm happy.

At least you have delicious maple syrup