It is better to upgrade internal fuse for cheap DMM with HRC grade for safety reason? One local shop sold me a pair of glass type as I was unable to find the stock ceramic version. Now I am kind of worry. Haha. Will upgrade to a better DMM later this year.
It depends on where you are using the DMM, a glass fuse cannot break a high current, it will arc over and the meter will explode.
As long as you are using the meter with low voltages and on mains protected with 10A to 16A fuses, that risk does not really exist.
i used a 20% off coupon and my 20% employee discount on this meter the other day cause i wanted t see how it worked. it actually isnt bad. lux meter only goes up to 40k s its isnt super useful but its still nice to have. http://www.harborfreight.com/5-in-1-digital-multimeter-98674.html
it is exactly the same as the Mastech ms8229. the probes even say Mastech on them. only reason i dint buy the mastech for 59 is because i work at HF so i got it for like $44
oh and i cant recall ever seeing this go on sale at my store. if you buy one and it goes on sale within 90 days i beleive, you can go back with receipt and get a price match
Thanks HKJ. I will not be measuring anything higher than 240V, guess I am safe for the moment.
What makes cheap meters unsuitable for a variety of testing is the contact resistance is poor and/or flaky. If you are testing something like copper braid over a tailcap spring, a good meter may give different results. Current measuring more of an issue than voltage, ohms even worse for lower values.
Cheap meters can be better for current measurement than the more expensive ones. The lack of a fuse will reduce the resistance.
Of course you need to use much better leads than the supplied ones.
i have amprobe and fluke, when i mesure current, i use 10A socket, not 300ma one. even when i mesure low current, 10A big fuse has less resistance than small 300ma fuse. however i think, resisiance of small fuse is low enough for sub 300ma readings. thou i still use 10A socket anyway.
i mean i could expect $20 dmm to have wires\fuses, that would screw the readings, but i would not expect $200 fluke, or amprobe to have those flaws.
It has nothing with screwing readings, it is just a higher burden voltage and a expensive meter is no guarantee for a low burden voltage (Some $1000 DMM's has a nearly useless 3A range for low voltage work).
On the mA range the fuse is not the problem, there it is the resistance of the sense resistor and protection circuit. With autoranging DMM's it is common to use same resistor for both mA ranges, making the high mA range have a rather high burden voltage and the low mA range will have a very low burden voltage.
ok, i just learned something new, thanks HKJ.