nivek@rover.ri.cmu.edu (Kevin Dowling) (01/13/90)
I've purchased a couple of the Fluke 87's after evaluating a number of others. In our past experience in the labs here the Fluke handhelds have given no trouble at all, are packed with features, and very easy to use and a wide variety of accessories are available. This is in comparison with Beckman, B&K's, some Radio Shacks, and others. I've heard that HP has recently come out with some handhelds; anyone use or see them? The 87 is an autoranging, true RMS meter. It measures capacitance 0.01nF-5uF 1% accuracy, diode tester, frequency counter from 0.5Hz up to 200KHz with 0.01Hz resolution, which can be used to display duty cycle and measure pulse width measurement, very good ranges and accuracies for AC/DC current and voltage of course, and analog bar graph to display trends, MIN MAX recording mode for recording up to 24 hours and calcluates true average. Powered by 9V battery and a very rugged (we've dropped it!) case with built in flexible stand (kinda like a gumby piece) Input alert that beeps if you plug the probes in the wrong terminals for the functioned being performed. REL mode for displaying difference between a stored value and new values. Touch-Hold so you don't have to wrestle with trying to see the meter while making a careful measurement. Display backlight, 4 1/2 digit display. Lots of stuff and we've used just about every feature many times. Bottom line: We paid about $225 for these from Marshall. Try electronics distributors in your area or some of the discounters too. If you don't need some of these features you might look at others in the Fluke 80 series. nivek Aka : Kevin Dowling Bell: (412) 268-8830 Arpa: nivek@rover.ri.cmu.edu Mail: Robotics Institute Carnegie Mellon University Pgh, PA 15213-3890