TIL my ancient multimeter was reading resistance totally wrong on a job last month

Spent 3 hours chasing a phantom short in a Cessna nav light circuit before I swapped to a Fluke and found the real problem in 10 minutes, anyone else had a tool lie to them like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

burns.brooke14d ago

Bought a cheap harbor freight clamp meter once and it was reading 50 amps on a circuit that was definitely off. Took me swapping the main breaker and checking literally every single outlet before I grabbed my buddies Klein meter and saw zero draw. Threw that thing straight in the trash and ate the $30 lesson lol.

tessawebb13d ago

Right, but here's the thing nobody talks about. Cheap meters sometimes have bad input protection, so that 50 amp ghost reading could have been a baby arc flash waiting to happen if you'd actually poked at something live. $30 lesson keeps you from becoming a statistic.