seca
1 800 542 7322
Toll Free Hotline

Glossary

Filter Glossary

Mass

Fundamental property of matter, independent of location.
1. Physical quantity which can be ascribed to any material object and which gives a measure of its quantity of matter.
2. Property of a body that results in its inertia to change in its state of motion, as well as its attraction to other bodies (gravitation).
3. One of the seven base quantities of the International System of Units (SI). The SI unit of mass is the kilogram (kg).

Maximum capacity

Maximum weighing capacity, not taking into account the additive tare capacity.

Maximum permissible error

Maximum difference, positive or negative, allowed by regulation between the indication of a scale and the corresponding true value, as determined by reference standard masses or standard weights, with the scale being at zero at no-load, in the reference position.

Maximum permissible error on verification

Maximum permissible error between the measurement value of a verified scale and the corresponding correct true value determined with certified weights at the time of verification.

Maximum safe load

Maximum static load that can be carried by the scale without permanently altering its metrological qualities.

Maximum tare effect

Maximum weight capacity of the additive tare device or the subtractive tare device.

Medical device

Any instrument, apparatus, appliance, material or other article, whether used alone or in combination, including the software necessary for its proper application intended by the manufacturer to be used for human beings for the purpose of diagnosis, prevention, monitoring, treatment or alleviation of disease, diagnosis, monitoring, treatment, alleviation of or compensation for an injury or handicap, investigation, replacement or modification of the anatomy or of a physiological process, control of conception, which does not achieve its principal intended action in or on the human body by pharmacological, immunological or metabolic means, but which may be assisted in its function by such means.

Medical devices manufacturer

Natural or legal person with responsibility for the design, manufacture, packaging and labelling of a medical device before it is placed on the market under his own name, regardless of whether these operations are carried out by that person himself or on his behalf by a third party.

Metabolic syndrome

Combination of different factors (e.g. excessive abdominal fat, high blood pressure, elevated blood sugar values and altered blood fat levels) that significantly increase the risk of diabetes mellitus type 2 or coronary heart disease and thus of associated effects such as heart attacks.
(cf. seca patient printouts)

Metric system of units

Originally referred to a group of units that were all derived from the meter. The units were for commercially important physical dimensions of length, area, volume, and mass (unit defined by mass of a specified volume of water). In modern metrology, a system of units is no longer traceable to a single unit, but all units of the system are traceable to a certain small number of basic units. In this sense, today’s International System of Units was developed from the metric system of units. It is the modern form of the MKSA metric system which has been expanded to seven basic units.

Metrology

Science of measurement that includes all theoretical and practical aspects of measurement.

Metrology mark

Identification of a non-automatic scale or weighing instrument as defined in the Measuring Instruments Directive by means of a black capital letter M on a green background. The Green M is affixed by the manufacturer to complete instruments (not to auxiliary devices or modules) to indicate conformity with the European Directive on Non-Automatic Weighing Instruments (2014/31/EC) or Directive on Measuring Instruments.

Minimum capacity

Value of the load below which the weighing results may be subject to an excessive relative error.

Multi-interval instrument

Scale having one weighing range which is divided into partial weighing ranges each with different actual scale intervals, with the partial weighing range determined automatically according to the load applied, both on increasing and decreasing loads.

Multiple range instrument

Scale having two or more weighing ranges with different maximum capacities and different actual scale intervals for the same load receptor, each range extending from zero to its maximum capacity.