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@Polka_Dot
Right!
I said earlier that the front wheel feels like it can take more tension, well, it turns out I was right.
I know, because I've just calibrated my spoke tension meter!
As I said, I have about 40 kg of cast iron weights to start of with, to make up the rest of the necessary weight I decided to use water. I popped down to the shop an bought 60 litres of mineral water. 12 five litre bottles. I carried them home in two trips using my trusty army bergen.
Now on with it. The bag itself weighs 4kg.
I weighed it with 6 bottles in it and got 35 kg. It's difficult to lift much more than this so that's what I started with. Then I put some of the iron weights in the side pockets and that brought it up to 55kg. At this point I took the first reading.
17.5
With this 2.0-1.8-2.0 spoke, measured in the middle, the reading should be 14.5
I started adding the bottles and took readings on the way up.
KG / READING / SHOULD BE
55 / 17.5 / 14.5
65 / 19 / 16
75 / 20.5 / 18
85 / 22 / 19
90 / 22.5 / 19.5
95 / 23 / 20
When I reached 75kg I found I needed to adjust the whole thing because the bag was starting to rest on the floor from the cord stretching. I took the weight off, shortened the cord and started again. By the time I got to 95kg the arrangement seemed pretty sketchy and I was a little nervous about something snapping, but nothing did.
At 95 I adjusted my meter so it gave the correct reading and then started to take the weight off, checking the new readings on the way down, which were all now correct.