Originally Posted by
sweeks
I went to the dark side and bought a Park Tools tensiometer (on sale) after my first couple wheels. I enjoy being able to have a bit more quantitative approach to the wheel assembly.
A friend showed up with one at a gathering, picked it up and put it on a few spokes and it registered no difference between ones where a difference was clearly audible.
Even for a ballpark absolute reading it seems like it would be best used to compare a wheel to a fixture with a scale applying a known tension to a spare spoke of the same sort.