Why no scanning non-contact thermometer?

[james]

I would love to have a thermo infrared camera for home maintenance, but they
are prohibitively expensive ($5K and up).

Non-contact thermometer, on the other hand, is pretty cheap at $50 and up.

It seems you can mount a non-contact thermometer on a pan and tilt platform
and perform a scan to create an image. It would be slow (non real time) and
non portable, but for home maintenance purpose, it is ok. This could cost a
lot less than $5K -- a poor-man's thermo infrared camera.

Does such product exist? I couldn't find any with google. Why?

 

[Sjouke Burry]

More reading on thermopile thermometers:
<http://optoelectronics.perkinelmer.com/content/ApplicationNotes/APP_Ambientcompensation.pdf>
<http://optoelectronics.perkinelmer.com/content/ApplicationNotes/APP_pyrometry.pdf>
from white papers at:
<http://optoelectronics.perkinelmer.com/Service/WhitePapers.html>
Looks like response time is going to be a big problem.

Problem is, you need a germanium lens and/or mirrors,
the detector is easier, get the thinnest platinum wire you
can get, make a very small(0.2 mm diameter and length) for a
fast response time at the focuspoint of the scanner, and put
a constant current through the wire, measure/amplify the voltage
across it, and voila, a (slow) IR scanner.