We're not done yet. The Solartron week continues ...
This one made me think about categories for test equipment. And I came up with:
Metrology grade
Laboratory grade
Workshop grade
Consumer grade
The 7061 clearly belongs to the laboratory grade, but the 7045, the topic of this post, has to be content with 'workshop grade', I'm afraid.
My little stack of 7045s:
![](https://i.imgur.com/2WFMN8V.jpg)
The tilted front makes sense for desktop use, but is a nuisance when you want to stack things. They could have tilted without raising it, but made the wrong decision, IMHO. As the device is rather light, pressing on the front lifts the back.
The plastic is horrible. These are 3 I grabbed from several more. And each of them had severe issues with the housing, often they were held together by tape because the set-in nuts for the screws were cracked out of the plastics. Despite the light weight I had trouble lifting them from their resting space: The rubber feet stuck like hell to the underground. No good start trying to seduce me.
![Huh? ???](https://www.eevblog.com/forum/Smileys/default/xhuh.gif.pagespeed.ic.6Nvt7O8a11.png)
I started with the uppermost, plugging in mains. Doesn't work. Lifting it, I find the mains plug falling out. What the ... What did they do here? The C14 receptable is recessed and my collared C13 plug can't be plugged in deep enough. Some designers really deserve some bashing.
![](https://i.imgur.com/33C3BlP.jpg)
Using another cable with a long plug the meter can be switched on and shows the 10.0 volts, or what it thinks the voltage is:
![](https://i.imgur.com/EICzVoz.jpg)
I have to confess that I actually plugged the test leads into the wrong sockets at first, because of the lousy lettering.
![](https://i.imgur.com/A5QCgHX.jpg)
I won't bore you with the resistance measurements - they were awfully off.
Instead we'll take a look at the inside, like with the others:
![](https://i.imgur.com/m7Xk7nF.jpg)
There's a holder for 4 D size NiCd cells, luckily it is empty (and not even connected). Away it goes:
![](https://i.imgur.com/MUBd1jx.jpg)
That's better. Clear signs of being recapped:
![](https://i.imgur.com/X5NKT9t.jpg)
A tidy underside:
![](https://i.imgur.com/bjkQ7gT.jpg)
And crappy plastics:
![](https://i.imgur.com/OKPWMd0.jpg)
![](https://i.imgur.com/3KnUb9Q.jpg)
The second and third worked better. Even the resistance measurement (1 kΩ) was good (Solartron seems to be good at this):
![](https://i.imgur.com/oREWnME.jpg)
The underside clearly explains what the internal circuitry looks like for the DUT. Nicely done:
![](https://i.imgur.com/DFoWejc.jpg)
In comparison with e.g., the Fluke 8050A, the 7045's display is much better, but in all other respects I'd prefer the Fluke.
Your mileage may vary.