No matter what type of electrical work you are doing, multimeters prove to be absolutely necessary. Whether you have to change a junction box, need to know how to test a phone line without a phone, or install a ceiling fan, multimeters come in handy. You can use this device for determining if the wires are hot or not and lots more. They are designed for measuring three fundamental components of electrical energy; ohms, amps and volts.
This means that you can use this device for measuring resistance, current and voltage. You can find analog as well as digital multimeters in the market, depending on the type of circuit that’s in use. These hand-held devices can normally be very useful for detecting faults or can also provide field measurements that are highly accurate.
However, there are some safety precautions that you need to take with a multimeter. It is not recommended to test your leads if the leads or probes’ protective insulation has cracked or is worn. You have to remember that both AC and DC voltage can be highly dangerous. Therefore, mostly electronic technicians and engineers are the ones who use multimetersand it is widely used for testing different kinds of equipment.
You can find multimeters in different voltage measurement ranges as well, which are 2.5 volts, 10 volts, 50 volts, 250 volts, 500 volts and 1,000 volts. The top of the multimeter also has a voltage range extender unit and this can be used for measuring voltage up to 5,000 volts. You can also check the accuracy of the multimeter before you decide to use it. Set it to the lowest setting for resistance and touch the red probe to the black. The display should read ‘0’ because the two probes shouldn’t have any resistance. As long as this remains the case, the multimeter will give you accurate results.
