Open Forum

We are looking to upgrade our current Temp and RH Hygrothermographs used in our museum to digital data loggers, preferably with wireless functionality. I'd love to hear what other museums are using now and whether they'd recommend them. What are the good and maybe not so good features for the ones you're using. I appreciate any recommendations and/or available resources regarding this subject. Thanking you in advance.

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Jody Tao
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Miami, FL
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Hi Jody,

We use Onset's HOBO dataloggers- the MX1101 offers Bluetooth-capability (wireless, but you need to be within a certain range to download them).  They have worked well for us, the wireless function allows me to complete our downloads more easily, and it is easier to check them while visitors are in the building by using their app on a cellphone or ipad.  (The HOBOmobile app is free, I believe).  The older models required me to plug into the units and this was tricky to do when visitors were in the building. They are also great for getting readouts from inside of display cases.

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Laura Resch
Cleveland Museum of Art
Cleveland OH
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-01-2020 04:52 PM
From: Jody Tao
Subject: Recommendations for digital data loggers in Museums

We are looking to upgrade our current Temp and RH Hygrothermographs used in our museum to digital data loggers, preferably with wireless functionality. I'd love to hear what other museums are using now and whether they'd recommend them. What are the good and maybe not so good features for the ones you're using. I appreciate any recommendations and/or available resources regarding this subject. Thanking you in advance.

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Jody Tao
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Miami, FL
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We also use Hobos with bluetooth functions, and I recently saw in a promotional email that they make a Wifi version, which would be useful now. I found something much cheaper (than Hobos) that we are using to monitor our spaces remotely now. It's not specifically made for museums, and we don't have much data collected yet, so I can't say whether we would recommend them long term. I wanted something with WIFI while a curatorial staff member is only onsite 3 times a week, and I bought them before I learned about the Wifi Hobos. We have one running side by side with a Hobo in two spaces and the readings are pretty close to each other.

My main point here is, if you are going to invest in Hobos, I would definitely investigate the WIFI option. If it works like the ones we have, we can all see the readings in the app on our phones.

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Laura Vookles
Chief Curator of Collections
Hudson River Museum
Yonkers NY
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-01-2020 04:52 PM
From: Jody Tao
Subject: Recommendations for digital data loggers in Museums

We are looking to upgrade our current Temp and RH Hygrothermographs used in our museum to digital data loggers, preferably with wireless functionality. I'd love to hear what other museums are using now and whether they'd recommend them. What are the good and maybe not so good features for the ones you're using. I appreciate any recommendations and/or available resources regarding this subject. Thanking you in advance.

------------------------------
Jody Tao
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Miami, FL
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I have also used  HOBO and found it very satisfactory. Recently they have been offering free webinars on their latest products. I don't know if there are any more scheduled, but you might check their website to see.

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Gail Nessell-Colglazier
Executive Search Consultant
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-01-2020 04:52 PM
From: Jody Tao
Subject: Recommendations for digital data loggers in Museums

We are looking to upgrade our current Temp and RH Hygrothermographs used in our museum to digital data loggers, preferably with wireless functionality. I'd love to hear what other museums are using now and whether they'd recommend them. What are the good and maybe not so good features for the ones you're using. I appreciate any recommendations and/or available resources regarding this subject. Thanking you in advance.

------------------------------
Jody Tao
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Miami, FL
------------------------------

Dear Jody,
There are a lot of products on the market that do a good job in monitoring temperature and relative humidity and several that can monitor additional parameters like light. The real key is understanding the technology and deciding what features best fit your needs. There is a balance between cost and features.  For an overview you can check out two webinars I did for the Connecting To Collections Care Site
Choosing the Datalogger That Is Right For You - https://www.connectingtocollections.org/recording-community-webinar-choosing-the-datalogger-that-is-right-for-you/
Wireless Environmental Monitoring: Is it right for you? - https://www.connectingtocollections.org/wireless-environmental-monitoring/
These presentations are already a few years old so they don't mention some of the newest products on the market. But they do explain the difference between terms like Bluetooth, Wifi logger, cloud software, etc.  that are important in deciding what may work for your intsitution. 

If you look at the Hobo line - you will want to look at the MX Bluetooth loggers combined with their new Gateway https://www.onsetcomp.com/mx-gateway/ which boosts the data to the cloud.  I believe that this is probably what the other respondents are referring to.

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Rachael Arenstein
A.M. Art Conservation LLC
rachael@amartconservation.com
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-01-2020 04:52 PM
From: Jody Tao
Subject: Recommendations for digital data loggers in Museums

We are looking to upgrade our current Temp and RH Hygrothermographs used in our museum to digital data loggers, preferably with wireless functionality. I'd love to hear what other museums are using now and whether they'd recommend them. What are the good and maybe not so good features for the ones you're using. I appreciate any recommendations and/or available resources regarding this subject. Thanking you in advance.

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Jody Tao
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Miami, FL
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AAMers,

If you're not sure if wireless data loggers will work for your collection, let us know and we'll send you a trial of the Conserv solution. It's extremely easy to setup and it runs on a SIM card so you don't have to worry about WiFi or hooking it up to your network. We're relatively new and we're not going to be the right fit for every collection, but we are 100% focused on building something that works great for collections. It's a great time to be thinking about setting up remote monitoring because we could be back to stay-at-home in the fall. start.conserv.io/covid19

Best,
Austin

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Austin Senseman
CEO @ Conserv
Birmingham, AL
asenseman@conserv.io
(m) 205-222-2847
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-01-2020 04:52 PM
From: Jody Tao
Subject: Recommendations for digital data loggers in Museums

We are looking to upgrade our current Temp and RH Hygrothermographs used in our museum to digital data loggers, preferably with wireless functionality. I'd love to hear what other museums are using now and whether they'd recommend them. What are the good and maybe not so good features for the ones you're using. I appreciate any recommendations and/or available resources regarding this subject. Thanking you in advance.

------------------------------
Jody Tao
Pérez Art Museum Miami
Miami, FL
------------------------------