Recently Bosch announced a new 50’ distance range finder GLM 15 ($49) which has a very specific purpose, simplicity. The unit has only 1 button so it doesn’t calculate volume, measure angles, won’t connect to your phone or play your favorite songs. All the bells and whistles have been stripped out beyond saving just the previous measurement. What the unit does focus on however is dead-on accuracy; at $49 you can buy other lasers which claim more features but may leave you wondering.
There are actually a surprising few OEM manufacturers of distance measurers even though every dozens of tool brand offers them. Leica is the other high end distance measuring laser manufacturer who makes distance lasers for themselves as well as many other popular tool brands. These lasers have similar accuracy with all the bells and whistles of popular Bosch models but can fetch a higher price. Once you get below the $100ish range things can get dicey and accuracy becomes an exponentially larger concern the cheaper you go.
Bosch has found that while there is a need for many different length/featured units including the GLR825 ($359) which can measure 825’ accurately, a much larger group of people just want a simple laser tool for measuring size of room, placement of fixtures, height of ceiling and other basic tasks which don’t require a range over 50’ or additional calculations. The biggest opportunity in the area of measuring is however to replace the tried and true tape measure with a laser beam. For jobs where a 1/8th or 1/16th of an inch matters such as installing cabinets, measuring for counter tops and other critical tasks people have been reluctant to trust low costs laser devices.
We put the new Bosch GLM 50 thought its paces taking dozens of various types of measurements and found it really can handle 6” to 50’ measurements equal to or better than a standard tape measure. Take the obvious tasks where the hook plays a big role such as measuring and scoring drywall, it is possible this laser could lead to more people leaving the tape measure in the truck and carry this compact unit in their tool belt, at least that’s what Bosch is hoping for.
For questions or more information on any Laser Measuring Tools give the pros at Ohio Power Tool a call 800-242-4424, they know there stuff whether its dot, line, rotary or distance measuring.
