Hi guys, I am new to this forum. I am wanting to track my BF% (wish I had started earlier) and I was wondering if anyone had a recommendation on the best model of body fat scale? I have figured out Tanita has the most models and I would like some of the memory features for my family to use to track our body fat percentage. I am leaning somewhat toward the Tanita 578 right now from what I"ve read, but thought that most of you guys probably use one and might have an opinion. I don't want to 'recreate the wheel' if I don't have to..
Thanks for any advice!
Leigh

P.S. I'm a 38 year old female...I've lost 53 lbs over the last 18 months with a high-protein, moderate carb, low fat (except EFA's) diet plus resistance training and cardio. I am an automotive engineer, married , and have 3 little girls. I was a competitive swimmer and athlete until the end of college and the abrupt change in activity levels totally freaked my body out along with my 3 pregnancies. I need to lose about 30 more lbs and want to end up at about 150 lbs with approx 21% bodyfat. I put on muscle fairly easily, but have a terrible time losing size below my waist. Upper body is pretty much where I want it, other than a little more muscle size. I"m working on my lower body by doing elliptical cardio (both HIIT and longer slower rounds) and running both wind sprints and distance on really hilly terrain around my house. (maybe I need to post this in an introduction forum...LOL :

Body fat scales are notoriously inaccurate. Save the $$$. According to my Tanita, I'm 21% BF as of this morning. I tested out at 12% by one of the gym trainers a few weeks ago and haven't been over 15% BF since about April of this year.

Get tested at your gym by a professional. It's the only way to find out your BF% and be as accurate as is possible. We're also a pretty good visual judge of BF%, so if you're feeling brave, snap a digital picture and it. Most of us have done so in the past...

-R

There's a digital fat caliper:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/acc/fattrack.html

Anyone have any experience with that? Look good.

I have heard about the inaccuracies of the scales...but was thinking it would be good to at least see if I'm making progress by the numbers dropping. Maybe I should just save my money. Right now, I don't belong to a gym (I have a pretty well decked out home gym and Precor elliptical) but I know I can get my numbers done by a professor at UAB here in town. I will do that. I think she can also measure my RMR with a breathing contraption of some sort.

As for the picture.....ummm....I will do it at some point...I promise. I am just embarassed of my lower body due to the excess skin from my 3 pregnancies that all required C-sections ( my long body causes me to carry my kids breech and face up! LOL) and the fact that my legs hold weight. I literally look to myself like two different bodies joined at the belly button. I am wondering how they will account for that if I were to have a skinfold measurement. I have seen a plastic surgeon and he says 80% of the 'droop' under my belly button is skin that's not going to tighten up and my muscles are separated out to the sides from having the kids and the muscles being cut while they were lengthened from the pregnancy.. He says it will be easy to repair and he could do it now if I'm ready, but I want to get closer to my goal bf% and weight before doing the surgery. Thanks for the advice and I'll see if I can get a representative pic that I"m not too ashamed of. I wish I had started doing bf% when I started my transformation!!

There's a digital fat caliper:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/acc/fattrack.html

Anyone have any experience with that? Look good.

It's fabulous, just takes a few minutes of getting used to (do it in front of a mirror, and make sure you actually grab the fold, not the skin around it, it makes for huge measurements), but once you do, it's quite easy and quite accurate.

However, I may be the only one here with a newer model Tanita. It gives me results within .3-5% of my accumeasure caliper reading.

plus, Tanita's digital precise weight is worth it.

It's the tanita BF680

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000094ZGH/qid=1092978774/sr=8-1/ref=pd_ka_1/102-5273562-0433709?v=glance&s=home-garden&n=507846

The scale reading is subject to changing conditions, but, if you measure consistently, it is accurate, although the Bodyfat % can go up and down in one session a little, so take 3-5 measurements.

I'd recommend a plain digital scale and the accumeasure.

There's a digital fat caliper:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/acc/fattrack.html

Anyone have any experience with that? Look good.

I got that exact product a couple of days ago. It looks pretty simple to use and I think that with a little practise it is quite a working solution for measuring bf%.

I've read people write that it's difficult to get the measurements properly but it doesn't seem to be that complicated once you practise it a bit. And I'm not that worried if the measurement is off by couple of percents, I'm mostly interested about the trend anyway.

Hi guys, I am new to this forum. I am wanting to track my BF% (wish I had started earlier) and I was wondering if anyone had a recommendation on the best model of body fat scale? I have figured out Tanita has the most models and I would like some of the memory features for my family to use to track our body fat percentage. I am leaning somewhat toward the Tanita 578 right now from what I"ve read, but thought that most of you guys probably use one and might have an opinion. I don't want to 'recreate the wheel' if I don't have to..
Thanks for any advice!
Leigh

P.S. I'm a 38 year old female...I've lost 53 lbs over the last 18 months with a high-protein, moderate carb, low fat (except EFA's) diet plus resistance training and cardio. I am an automotive engineer, married , and have 3 little girls. I was a competitive swimmer and athlete until the end of college and the abrupt change in activity levels totally freaked my body out along with my 3 pregnancies. I need to lose about 30 more lbs and want to end up at about 150 lbs with approx 21% bodyfat. I put on muscle fairly easily, but have a terrible time losing size below my waist. Upper body is pretty much where I want it, other than a little more muscle size. I"m working on my lower body by doing elliptical cardio (both HIIT and longer slower rounds) and running both wind sprints and distance on really hilly terrain around my house. (maybe I need to post this in an introduction forum...LOL :


I just purchased the Tanita 680 from drugstore . com on sale for 49.99 (free shipping). Seems to be fairly accurate so far as to both weight and body fat. Easy to use and pretty neat. Also, see this thread

http://forums.johnstonefitness.com/showthread.php?t=7439

Thanks Don and Petri. 30 bucks... why not give it a run.