What to look for in a Multimeter

[Dave Russell]

Hi Ben,
I'm familiar with hi-tec measuring equipment. Also familiar with squibs/ignitors. I was part of the original "Lockheed Missiles & Space Development" teams - Agena & Polaris.

My original intent in reply to Ken's post, was an easy way to measure currents (25 amps) with a "low cost" multimeter.

16 gage Ni-Chrome wire is quite robust mechanically (hard to nick) & can easily handle 25 amps without "exploding". It is equivalent to what you describe.
Quote:
"Instead I would recommend a high wattage current sensing resistor in series with your load and then measuring the voltage across it."
D

 

[Ken G]

To Ben's remark about analog versus digital, that is precisely the point. If the quantity being measured is constant, it makes no difference. If the quantity is periodically and rapidly varying, as was the case with my generator field current, you are usually interested in the average, and an analog meter movement provides the averaging simply because it is a mass/spring device that cannot move rapidly. A digital meter doesn't apply averaging in quite the same way, and may (as mine did) vary so wildly as to give no useful information.

Ken G, 1925 Rover 16/50 (San Francisco)