About Us

Kett History

Kett was started by four engineers in 1946.  After initially introducing a wood moisture tester and metal detector, it was their vision to design and manufacture portable handheld moisture analyzers. The goal was to provide a rice farmer with the same level of measurement quality available within government test labs.  As is still true today, the customer depended on the accuracy of this measurement and the reliability of his instrument to standardize the quality of his harvested rice product.  This tandardization would provide him with an optimal harvest yield, maximizing his return on investment.

After the successful introduction of the Riceter, which is still the standard for portable rice moisture testing, the Kett development staff expanded into Coating Thickness Gauges for the emerging Japanese automobile industry.  In addition, they quickly released additional moisture testers for other agricultural applications and infrared Moisture Balances for general purpose moisture analyses.
Awards for instrument design and performance followed shortly after and continue to this day.

Today our focus is moisture and organic composition analysis, coating thickness measurement, friction, wear, peel, adhesion and other surface property analyses, rice quality instrumentation and other agricultural test instruments for the grain and seed marketplace.

Our Philosophy

We haven't deviated from our original goals - Laboratory quality measurements that can be easily obtained by anyone on your staff.   This provides our customers with unsurpassed versatility both on who can use the instruments and where they can be used - optimizing measurement feedback for Just-in-Time processes for anyone wanting to maximize their quality systems.

Secondly, we try to provide cost-effective durability, providing our customers with years of use from any of our instruments.   Instead of planned obsolescence, our continual improvement design process expects each new product release to be more durable than the last - - hard to do when many of our instruments are still in operation after 40+ years of continual use.

Finally, we aim to design ergonomically usable features into each instrument - items, controls, and accessories that enhance the user's experience.  If your staff enjoys the test process and believes they can easily get accurate measurements, they are more likely to increase the number of times they conduct a test - improving your development and manufacturing processes.   At the same time, we try to avoid adding seldom-used features that make the instrument more complex and cumbersome.