WTB: Fluke Multimeter

stylesforfree

Looking to buy a decent Fluke Multimeter to aid me in building some DIY electronics, small stuff like single ended guitar amps, microphone preamps and other audio gear.

Budget is around £100

Sporky

What functions do you need? I've got a 20 year old one in a drawer somewhere. 

thermionic

A few years ago Fluke brought out a range that was only intended for sale in China, but of course they quickly found their way here via ebay. I bought a 15B+ for about £70 (UK seller) and it’s a decent meter imho (I worked in electronics years ago and used much more expensive Flukes). Looks like they’re now just over £100.

stylesforfree

Sporky said:

What functions do you need? I've got a 20 year old one in a drawer somewhere. 

I just need it to read component values, diodes/transistors/capacitors/resistors etc...so ohms mainly but also might give building an amp a go at some point in the future. So ohms and voltage reading I think

Danny1969

Volts, mVolts, Amps and Ohm's are essential. Diode mode showing the voltage drop is also essential. 

In terms of reading capacitor values and inductance a meter is of limited use. Ordinary caps will generally fail short circuit or to the point you can measure them as resistors. Especially Tantalum caps.  Electrolytic caps need an ESR meter really to get a meaningful display of their health. Especially in SMPS and class D applications
You can use diode mode to a point to test some transistors but MOSFETS can catch a lot of people out when testing with a meter because the gate & drain junction has such a high impedance the small voltage from the meter is enough to forward bias it and it will stay forward biased for a while when lifted out of circuit leading many to think the junction is shorted and the device is blown. 

I have a cheap meter that has transistor mode and cap mode etc but I only ever use the temp mode on it really. For everything else I use a basic 25 year old Fluke 77 because it  has life saving auto ranging and high speed reading.