Used $100-200 Bench DMM ?

[David Hess]

I went with a Keithley 177 for $80 total. It powers on but not tested.

It's 4.5 digit, and has 20u division, compared to 200u on pretty much all the other ones that price.

I used to see a lot of Keithley 177s used with strain gauge bridges because of its 20 millivolt range.  I think HP had a similar 4-1/2 digit meter with a 20 millivolt range.

The Keithley 177 has full documentation and used standard parts so it should be very repairable and calibration does not require anything special.

[lordvader88]

Ahhh 20uA and 20mV, thought it was 20uV. But  yeah most other sub $150 ones are 200mV

And it's a lot more repairable then the $200 HP/Flukes. And I Had money left over to order some more oscilloscope probes, a multi-set of DMM probes, a 300W power resistor, etc.

I have a Mastech 5308 LCR meter with Kelvin probes. No idea what it's resolution or accuracy is or is supposed to be. But so I do have something with Kelvin probes.

[coromonadalix]

the 177 seems very nice for its age, not too high tech, schematics available,  tons of switches to clean, but eh   if it works well,  good findings

the 197 seem a good contender too ?? 5 1/2 digit 220,000 counts, supposed to do 1uv up to 1k volts ??

[coletas]

Hi! just relaunching this old topic for sharing this.

Is a GPIB interface built with an arduino mega and a cheap tm1638 display controller for a fluke 8842a (I suppose other DMM's can be adapted easy too). Altough my VFD display is still perfect, I just wanted to have the display in other place and have a continuity beeper.

Since I just built it for personal needs, if anyone needs it, please tell me and I will document the project.

[RichardM]

Hi, I would be interested in seeing your project documented. Looks interesting.

Richard