Multimeter, a good deal?

I was at Radio Shack today and saw/purchased a multimeter. I am not real sure I have any business owning one but I couldn't resist. I see all the voltage checks, resistance, total voltage, Ma that you guys are doing and at the deal they offered I couldn't say no.

I think this thing was a good deal (I only say that and only bought the thing because it was 55% off. Regularly $85 and on sale for $39. It is the LCD Digital Multimeter with Auto-Ranging and Ture RMS (That's what the box says)

I hope I bought the right thing in the event I ever get around to trying a mod or I become one of the famous CPF testers or something. I am going to look through the manual and see if there is ANYTHING I can use this for. Any suggestions for practicing/playing with this thing?

Check out the voltage of tiger light before it's on and after it's on, check out how many amps it takes...

55$ off?!

wow, i need one too! is it any good...i hope the deal is here too.

Diesel Dave,
You may want to try this multimeter I found at science surplus website. Although I think yours may have more functions this one I had to order. I returned my cheaper Radio Shack multimeter I bought and this one is on it's way now. Here is a link http://www.sciplus.com/singleItem.cfm?terms=6467&cartLogFrom=Search
Take a look around the site while you are there I find a lot of my toys here.

Keeping it real, bright ,
Wylie

Digital multimeters under $20 are pretty common, but unless you find some kind of special deal they aren't in the same league as the more expensive meters. As usual, you get what you pay for. That said, the MM I use was $16.

Wow. When I'm the first guy to make a positive post, we're in trouble!!!

To me, it sounds like you've got a deal. "True RMS" means that the meter figures out the actual rms=root-mean-squared voltage or current, rather than taking the peak value and multiplying by .707. It's for measuring AC current and voltage, and it means you can set it to the AC voltage range and actually see what the heck your power voltage really is.

Ok, first thing, is you should read and find out what the maximum current you can measure is, and if there's a fuse. This is about the only thing you can do to wreck the meter, and that's to try to measure a current more than the meter can do. It's probably between 2amps and 10amps, and you may have to plug the leads into a different jack for the high amperage range. That Tigerlight probably puts out more than 2 amps, so be carefull with that one.

Next, you can measure all your batteries. If only just for fun. That meter should be good enough to tell about how used an alkaline cell is by measuring. This isn't the normal way to check batteries, without any load, but it usually works pretty well. (What you probably can't tell is how used a lithium or NiMH cell is, because they're so flat.)

Next, you can check out the car! A fully charged 12v car battery is about 12.65 volts. 75% is about 12.4 volts, 50% is about 12.2 volts, 25% is about 12.0 volts, and at less than about 11.6 you've got a cooked battery. While charging, you should see about 13.8 volts. Oh, and you can try the AC voltage range to look at the ripple voltage on the output of a 12v socket.

You can use the resistance range to check light bulbs, wires, etc. The "diode check" feature is especially cool, as you may be able to use this to check which direction to put an LED in. I say "may", because they don't always have enough voltage to check an LED.

Ok, and if it has a beeping continuity thing, then this is the handiest thing to have when checking for shorts in connectors and tracing wires.

I'm sure there's more...

Now I have a something to do with this thing. It has 2 fuses and the instructions say 10 amps. I think I will read the rest of the book and go to bed. Thanks!