I went to sears today and wa slooking to get one but they have them from $20-$80....I was wondering which ones I can disregard b/c they have options or readouts that I really wont utilize...$20 do the job as good as $50 or $80 for just plugging it in to the TPI sensors etc? Which do you have? Thanks.

 

I have a $20 Sears one, but for setting the TPS and basically reading everything your computer wants to let you know about, I use and recommend anyone with these FI motors buy a scanner........AutoXray has a nice unit for about $150, best $150 I have spent on tools...............and I have about $10K worth.

 

I have a 400 dollar Fluke. That is overkill. The auto ranging feature is awesome though. To answer your question any Multimeter should be fine for checking Voltages since most sensors work off of logic levels.

 

Thereare some added benefits that you may be interested in.

Frequency: if used with an inductive pick-up on a plug wire, it will give you very accurate RPM.

Amps: make sure that it's at least capable of 10 amps, or it's pretty useless if it's only 2.

Analog (needle guage) meters are nice to have as well, digital meters don't sample fast enough and are difficult to read when dealing with fluctuating voltage etc. These can be had pretty cheap too, and can save a lot of headaches.

Accuracy: this is a big one! If you are dealing with sensors of FI, then the meter should be reasonably accurate. For instance, the ECM feeds exactly 5.00 volts to the throttle position sensor, and if you want to set your return voltage and it's a 10th volt off, that's a big deal! Obviously a meter like a Fluke will be fairly accurate and is not that expensive, as they have come down in price. The Fluke 87 is nice. You can always check a not so fancy meter with a nicer one, as a sort of crude calibration. Temp and abuse will also affect the readings. Meters are a good investment, and having a garbage one is also nice to have that you can bring with you and loose it, without baging your head against the wall.

 

I use a fluke like that at work, very nice meter.

If all you want to do is measure voltage I'd get the lowest prices digital readout one you can. A nice feature to have is an audible continuity test, where it will beep when you short the 2 leads, this is good for figuring out pinouts.

For working on a FI motor, however, I'd reccomend a scanner that will analyze the data stream... Very very useful. You can buy one or build an interface to use your laptop. Check on the diy prom board for info about making a scanner.

 

I have a few Fluke meters, those are the best.


I might have one of these left, sell it cheap.
(This is what some of my meters looks like, this one happens to be a Multi-Frequency Counter)

 

I have a Fluke and an AutoXray... that covers just about everything.

The Craftsman catalog (which I lost, naturally) has a multimeter that also does car functions, like dwell, RPM... also has a thermocouple. I think it ran around 130$