S4ordie

The old Fluke meter is gradually giving up the ghost. It is from the time of Disco so it has provided good service.

I am in the market for a good replacement. What is/are the recommended units that work well and meet the needs of 928 test?

Thanks for all input.

GlenL

Get two or three cheap meters. You can meet the needs of automotive electronics with something accurate to 1% in the most extreme cases and 5% usually. The vast majority of the time you're looking for shorts, opens and something near 12VDC.

Earl Gillstrom

My Fluke is giving up also. I replaced it with a half dozen $5 harbor freight meters. All work perfect with enough accuracy to work on cars. Sometimes you can catch a sale when they are $2.95. I put one in each car and one in the electronics room and a few in the garage.
I wish the HF battery maintainers were the same quality. As far as I can tell, they are all bad.

karl ruiter

I also have gone the route of buying a whole box of $2.95 HF meters. Totally a reasonable idea. But a year or so later they are somehow all gone. Guess I just did not care enough to take care of them.

Fluke still makes a fine DMM, although I hate to say it because I compete with them, and because John Fluke sold out a few years ago to a huge corperation called Danaher, and such things are generally not great for customers.

In a more reasonable price range, I have gotten very good service from my BK Precision units. The one on my desk is 391, although it looks like their current thing is the 270x line. It would be nice to find something that takes couple of AA batteries rather than the standard 9V as the 9Vs are getting expensive. I have been paying up to $9 for those stupid 9V batteries which will match the cost of the meter after a few years. With the rise of inexpensive boost converters more and more people are going with the AAs, but I don't really see it hitting DVMs yet.

SharkSkin

My Fluke 29 served me well until I frapped it out(dumb mistake). Like all Flukes, it's designed to shrug off a 6-foot fall to concrete without the rubber boot around it, and is well protected against mistakes(except really, really dumb mistakes). I especially liked the very high-resolution, fast-response analog bar display along the bottom, and had many occasions to use the frequency counter(makeshift tach), diode checker, and capacitance checker. For $50 it can't be beat IMHO. Fluke leads are very high quality, with various clips and adapters available to clip them to test points to keep your hands free. Whatever you get, Fluke leads(if they fit) would be a great upgrade. Note that I cleaned up my 15-year old leads from the 29 and am using them on the 179 -- the new leads that came with the 179 are tucked away, probably to be handed out when my will is read.

When I sent mine for repair, I had a choice -- $150 flat rate repair or $200 to upgrade to the Fluke 179, so I went with the 179 and have already found the backlit display to be handy, and the direct-thermocouple reading(no bulky temp adapter) is useful as well. But then, I have a LOT of uses for the meter and need the precision for some of the non-928 stuff that I do.

Depending on your budget, if you really want to have it all the 336 ClampMeter will also safely measure DC current at any current level you'll find in a 928, even cranking amps -- though you would forego the seldom-used freq counter and capacitance meter. You can also get current clamps that will plug into any meter that has the right spacing between the terminals.

ew928

The cheeeep HF meter I got was reading volts in X2 units.
As in my car was running at around 27-28 volts. Sigh.
But I did like the audible tone for resistance test so I don't have to keep looking at the
LCD readout when tracing for dead short.

9V cells are evil. Great for licking the '+' '-' contacts when I was a kid.
But shorted easily to anything metallic and not cheap at all.
Can't really run rechargeable 9V as they don't last that long in uncharged state.

RevAgent

I've been using this Craftsman MM for a couple of years now with great results:
http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_1...ers+%26+Meters

-Mark

jleidel

I built one from a kit... I admit, I'm a nerd. I tested it against a midrange Fluke and it measures well within spec.

danglerb

I use a probe dmm the most, but have a LOT of meters including a $2 HF (mines kinda flaky on one lead connection), but HF actually has a nice looking large digit automotive model for $35. My Probe DMM was about $30.

1 ma to 80 am AC/DC clamp DMM would be sweet, but $137.
http://www.handsontools.com/ESI-687-...MM_p_5765.html

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=95670

dr bob

I've had such good service out of the Flukes that I wouldn't hesitate to buy another. The 'current' one in garage service is a 25yo model 77. Just today I was rustling through the meter drawer and found an unopened H-F DMM that I had bought to leave on the boat. It reads 10.02 volts on he car battery, vs the hopefully-more-correct 12.3 displayed on the Fluke 77.

In my more "industrial" bag I have a Fluke 89 and a 189 for process instruments, and a collection of now very 'vintage' Beckman DMM's.

I keep the Fluke 77 for daily garage use because it autoranges, has the protective rubber bumper sleeve that others mention, and lives in a case with a massive collection of Fluke test leads that Dave mentions. I've tried the smaller Flukes, like the 12 and the 29, but keep pulling out the 77 with the bigger display. Still, I wouldn't mind having the DC amp clamp meter, and maybe a scope-meter in the collection. Can't possibly have too many toys or tools, right?

Alan

Flukes are good quality - however they may be overkill for most occasional users. its actually more useful to have several meters available so if budget is a concern - go with less expsnive options...

I have 2 very expensive meters, and many cheap ones... aside from ruggedness & some user friendly features (max reading hold, autoranging, memory, meter stands etc) they all work well enough for most automotive needs.

Clamp meters are sometime useful (but careful most are AC only - useless), capacitance, inductance and temp sensors can be useful occasionally.

Plug in ATC Fuse type ammeters are vey useful...

Longer test leads and a range of probes & clip options are much more important than most DMM features

I'd go with 2 inexpensive meters (unless money is no object - or you wil use it a lot) one basic Volts/Amps/Ohms and the other with a few more features, then get an extra set of good quality long probe leads with crocodile clip extra ends and small clip/hook on extra ends for terminal probing...

Alan

jorj7

I don't need a professional quality (read expensive!) DMM, but I do need one that's accurate
enough and versatile enough to check things on the car. I opted for an Extech MA220. It
seems to do a decent job. I do have a few HF DMM, but most of them don't work more then
a year or two. I also have a couple of Radio Shack units, which work well for voltage and
resistance, but not much more. I've used the Extech for Amperage and Temps, plus the usual
Volts and Ohms.

Alan

Oh BTW I also have one mini-meter & leads in the car in my emergency kit. I actually have an old mini analog meter for this so I am not dependant on a battery working... (not sure if you can even still buy them).

Anyway - having a small meter along for the ride for emergencies is not a bad idea.

Alan

danglerb

Fuse buddy is on my list of things to buy, maybe both types, lead adapter and with its own current meter, $15 to $25.

I'm not sure of this, but seems like when the new regulations about higher voltages was put in place, all the meters switched to the same "Fluke" style connections where the contacts are all inside an insulating shell. Anybody know of a source of modestly priced good quality test leads of this type?