Multimeters How to use 'em!
Introduction
The most important debugging tool in any E.E.'s toolbox is a trusty multimeter. A multimeter can measure continuity, resistance, voltage and sometimes even current, capacitance, temperature, etc. It's a swiss army knife for geeks!
What you will learn!
You should go through all of these sections in order, as they build on each other.
  1. Continuity measurements
    How to tell if two points are electrically connected
  2. Resistance measurements
    How to measure resistance - resistors, potentiometers and sensors
  3. Voltage measurements
    How to measure voltage - battery testing, wall-wart adaptor testing, and the terror of mixed AC/DC measurements.
What to look for?

Everyone always asks What multimeter should I get?

Well, since they're rather commodified (there are dozens of manufacturers) it is hard to make everyone use the same model, even though it would make things easier.

These are the necessities:

Here are nice things to have in your meter

These are things that I rarely (if ever) use, in decending order

Where to get one?

I have a selection of suggested meters on this page, I strongly suggest the "better" (At $15 its a great value) or "best" ($50, autoranging, has a temp probe, all sorts of other junk) ones as the "good" one is really kinda bad. If you already have a multimeter then just use that one. I'll only be covering digital multimeters here so if you have an analog one, it may be a little different and you'll have to experiment to figure out what's up

A good multimeter will cost about $25. I suggest getting a ranging one , with current testing, and a wide range as well as easy-to-replace battery. You don't need to spend $200 on a Fluke 73! A $50 meter will be excellent. Auto-ranging meters may keep you from tripping up on ranges at first, but they're slower and often flakier.

I have had a Wavetek Meterman 27XT for half a dozen years and its been really good to me, but it was also about $80.

More links

Here are many other links for learning how to use a multimeter

August 24, 2009 15:13