I just talked with a friend of mine who just bought a laser range finder and he's raving about it. I've never heard of these things but they sound pretty cool....how does it work, so I don't sound like an idiot to my friend. I hate when he knows something that I don't because he never lets me hear the end of it.
Our answer
Tom..I can relate. I have friends like that too...let's see if we can help you out with your question. A typical laser rangefinder will use an invisible, eye-safe Class 1 Laser beam which is "bounced" off distant targets with just the press of a button. Then, the range finder's high-speed digital clock measures the time it took for a laser beam to reach a target and return to the unit. Next, using advanced digital electronics, the rangefinder instantly calculates the distance within ±1 yard and shows the range in either yards or meters on a through-the-lens LCD Display. The entire process is so fast that less than a second elapses between the time you press the button to generate a laser beam to the time the exact range to your target is displayed.
