A bit of insight please :)

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awc

awc

Senior Member
Location
Indiana
Hello everyone, I hope it's ok that i ask this question here. Don't mean to steal any valuable time away from anyone but just curious what some of your suggestions are for a new Multimeter. I carry a FLUKE and i've been quite happy with it but i'd like to see about getting one with the AMP clamp and I figured that why not use all of your input to help guide my decision. I was looking at the 336 but please give me your reviews etc. All your input is greatly appreciated!
 
awc

awc

Senior Member
Location
Indiana
Sorry gents, some more background would be helpful huh. I do about 80% residential and the remainder commercial, which seems to be slowly increasing. That about sums me up. I'm sure I don't need anything fancy but I feel that depending on price if I step up maybe one above what I need I someday may be glad I did but you never know where life is going to take you.
 
480sparky

480sparky

Senior Member
Location
Iowegia
ultramegabob said:
it depends on what kind of work you do, in my opinion, most electricians buy waaaaaaaay more meter than they will ever need.
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I always tell cubbies to buy the best meter they can afford. It sucks to go out and spend $40 for a plain-jane VOM, then 6 months later you need a true-RMS digital.

Same principle applies to all tools. Buy the best your wallet can stand. Worked with a new guy one time who scoffed at us spending 200$+ for a cordless drill. Said he could get one just as good for fifty bucks. So the next week, he shows up all proud and pleased and punch with his new, no-name, made-in-China drill.... with two batteries and a charger. Brand name was something like Hukyaka.

Charger was a trickle charger that took 20 hours to fully charge a dead battery. If you let it charge too much, it overheated and killed the battery. Instructions had a chart to use to determine charge time based on how disgarched the battery was. How do you determine that? Is it 30% discharged? 50%? 80%? By the end of the second week, he wasn't too proud of his money-saving deal. One battery wouldn't take a charge, and the other was always charging. Next monday, he shows up with a 14.4 DeWalt. (This was back before 18s were out...)
 
iaov

iaov

Senior Member
Location
Rhinelander WI
I have a Fluke 87. It is more meter than I need,true, but I call it my "Teller of Truths". I have never regretted spending extra money on top of line tools. I also fish with a Sage fly rod. More fly rod than I need, true, but I have never regretted spending the money on top of the line tools er toys either.:D
 
J

jeremysterling

Senior Member
Location
Austin, TX
I thought about buying the 336 when I misplaced my 332 but got the 333 instead (cost). I do not even take the 333 to work anymore (commercial service). I use my 332 on a daily basis (I found it). It is smaller, therefore easier to carry and easier to get the amp clamp in tight places. No RMS on either of my meters. You could say I don't know what I'm missing.:smile:

I'm not saying the 332 is the best for its price range, but it I give it 4 out of 5.

The lead connections are getting loose and no backlit display. Every now and again I accidentally push the "hold" button.
 
ultramegabob

ultramegabob

Senior Member
Location
Indiana
I have collected a bunch of meters over the years, a few that are in the truck right now are a Fluke 77 III that I bought at a rummage sale that had never been taken out of the box for 10.00, a Craftsman digital clamp on that cost 59.00 brand new, an old Wiggy type soleniod tester that someone gave me years ago, and an old craftsman analog meter. I have had flukes, amprobes, Craftsman, GB Speerys, etc, etc, over the years and it seems that if you work for a company with alot of differnt guys, the more a meter costs, the more often it grows legs and walks away. unless you have a need for checking amperage on DC circuits it seems to me you are spending 200 dollars more than you need to by buying the 336, my 59.00 Craftsman does everything I need it to for residential and commercial service calls, and if I drop it or lose it, It wont be such a hit to have to replace it. for probly another 20 bucks, you could get a craftsman that has larger jaws if you would need them. I have grown past buying meters for the wow factor to impress the guys that I work with;)
 
wbalsam1

wbalsam1

Senior Member
Location
Upper Jay, NY
480sparky said:
........... It sucks to go out and spend $40 for a plain-jane VOM, then 6 months later you need a true-RMS digital.......

.........Same principle applies to all tools. Buy the best your wallet can stand.....
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I've learned the hard way over the years the advice noted above.

For example: I needed to replace a professional reverb outboard processor for my recording studio and thought "what the heck, this unit here is only $750.00 bucks instead of paying 2 grand, I'll get this one." Well, you all know what happens....By the time I ended up where I needed to be, I had spent $2,750.00. Then I was left with a $750.00 unit I couldn't use and when I went to sell it, no one on earth was dumb enough to buy it, so I ended selling it for way less than I bought it for. :mad: Just dumb...that's all.:D Same goes with electrical tools and instruments.
 
S

steved

Senior Member
Location
Oregon
I asked a similar question a while back and got a number of suggestions. I wound up getting an AEMC F09. I'm happy with it. It's a convenient size and does everything I need. It cost more money than I really wanted to spend, but it didn't wind up in my collection of junk tools that I never use.
 
quogueelectric

quogueelectric

Senior Member
Location
new york
Started with Simpson then Beckman then fluke Then better fluke then better fluke and carry cheap 20$ radio shack dvm in my toolbox just to have handy. Piece of crap but usefull in the field until I pullout one of the big boys.
 
D

Doug S.

Senior Member
Location
West Michigan
I carry an 87, but back when I was "out and about" more, I carried my wiggy, the 87, and a little Fluke clamp/DVM. I always want the wiggy around... It's hard to lie to a solenoid. More and more I'm thinking about going back to something like forementioned AEMC F09.

I guess for me, when it comes to a meter TRUST is the key factor, and for whatever reason buying something that is Yellow, and Expensive makes me feel a little more comfortable. I don't TRUST the auto AC/DC feature, but that's only an opinion. I do trust my life, daily, to my Fluke 87 and my Wiggy.

They haven't let me down... ... ... yet :grin:
 
e57

e57

Senior Member
Location
San Francisco, CA
awc said:
Sorry gents, some more background would be helpful huh. I do about 80% residential and the remainder commercial, which seems to be slowly increasing. That about sums me up. I'm sure I don't need anything fancy but I feel that depending on price if I step up maybe one above what I need I someday may be glad I did but you never know where life is going to take you.
Click to expand...

I have a 322/117 combo - I leave the 117 at home often, but mostly in the van - the 322 is in my vest at all times. IMO if you do ANY troubleshooting at all - the crap about 'way too much meter' is just that... The 322 is a simple and not very expensive meter (little more than $100) in the broader sceme of things. Seriously, if you use it once you could pay for itself in certain situations. Really, the ammeter is the most valuable option on it, followed by the ohmeter, and voltmeter uses. The funny thing is that you'll use those functions in a reversed frequency. And the option for DC is indespensable, if/when you need it. And for the price of this combo - you get TWO meters and all the function of the 336. (except DC current you would need to get these, but I can not remember the last time I needed DC current...)

True, there are a lot of "electricians" out there who "pull conductors through holes in one way or another" - and may never even terminate or energize anything they have done. And for every 50 or so of those there is an "ELECTRICIAN" who does the rest and sorts out all the problems. Or the service call guy who shows up in the middle of the night who would not be caught dead without a decent clamp-meter.

That said, as far as the meters mentioned - the 322 is a decent "Averaging" (i.e non TRMS) clamp-meter for the money, and will take some abuse, a simple no bells and whistles tool. The 322/117 combo is an awsom deal IMO. The F09 is a simular meter with a number of bells and whistles added for twice as much. And comparable to the 336 IMO.
The 87 - I used to have one of those as well - great meter! Especially if you have an amp-clamp for it - but that, and the meter combined will put you at ~$450+ - And that is way too much meter for most people... Wiggy is useless garbage! [duck] And the old Simpson black box is a nostalgic peek in to the past.
 
W

wawireguy

Senior Member
You need to consider how much amperage you might need to read with it and how much voltage you will be measuring. Get one that matches those needs. Personally I like Fluke. I have a Ideal and while it has a good warranty it isn't as solid as a Fluke product. Been replaced once already under warranty.
 
Besoeker

Besoeker

Senior Member
Location
UK
For what it's worth, for a multimeter I use a Fluke77 which is at least 10 years old but is has an anual calibration certificate as required by most of our customers - and to keep our quality accreditations valid.
I have a Fluke 1000:1 split core current transformer that plugs directly into the meter so I can make current measurements.
That's mostly what I use for general purpose stuff.
Some of what I do is of a specialist nature so sure, I routinely carry around a bit more kit than that in the trunk (boot) of my car.
And I have moved on from the 12-pot Jag in the avatar....not enough space in the trunk and, at 100.000 miles, it was time for a change.
 
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