What a waste of money, I paid around 500 marks at that time, its around $400USD.

Meter consist of 5-6 resistors only…

The way it measure capacitance is basically analog ohm meter, user just reads another scale. So once capacitor is connected a scale deflects and goes back right away, you have to watch how far it deflected on a scale…

For that much money I expected a lot more, what a ripp off. Its been 12 years ago, it still hurts ..

BEAUTY!

I found my way to this blog ,
because I just got on eBay, an old analog BBC Metrawatt MA4S , and was searching for info and specs.

http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/6818/bbcma4s.jpg

If you enjoy the clicking sound of them ,
I will borrow my unit, so to play with.. LOL

Best regards from Greece ..

I have both Sanwa and Metrahit Outdoor.
Both are great,but the feel is quite different.
Sanwa does not have some features – for example,an backlight of the display,it is not built so solidly like the Gossen.
The bargraph acts in a totally another way (mre nerveous,maybe because they are re-freshing the readings quicker)
Gossen is a meter with a ” character”,You have to fit to some of the radical ideas of the people which has created it,but when You do,no other meter is good for You,even the Fluke.

I enjoyed your presentation

The USB-adapter isn’t that expensive.. you can buy it in Belgium for 207

One of my dad’s friends, an electrician.

His name was Keith, I was about 8 years old and we were working on some sort of volunteer project involving electrical wiring. I followed Keith around helping pull wires and being general gofer, watching him twist wire nuts, install sockets when he tells me to get his VOM out of the van, a Simpson beauty with the heavy bakelite case and large analog meter.

Instead of taking it from me, he instructs me to hold it so he can see it and to turn the switch to a certain position. Click, click, click, click…

Being a free-range child of the ’60s, from this gateway drug, it was a quick step into farm wiring for things like electric fences, pumps, barn lighting, on to resurrecting tube radios and all sorts of devices that could quickly fry you in an instant of smoking electric death.

So, I readily identify with your audio geek porn. Click, click, click… Nothing like a well constructed rotary switch!

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To Alan Parekh:
The DC jack is also sealed (IP 52) and there is also an waterproof multimeter METRAHIT OUTDOOR with the same funcions like the X-TRA, but IP65:

http://www.gossenmetrawatt.com/english/produkte/metrahitoutdoor.htm

Regards

Claude

In the blog you suggest that you wouldn’t know it has an internal temperature sensor, but the temperature sensor makes sense, because you need it to do temperature measurements with thermocouples. Even my cheap chinese multimeter has it! (Or is the temperature probe not just a thermocouple?)

I had never heard of Gossen Metrawatt, so thanks for the review!

Tom

Yes, Gossen is a company with a long history. The physical barrier for volts and current measurement is not new. I have a Metrahit 23S from a few years back and has the same. Only 2 different current range entries. up to 300mA and a 16 A range. It saved me a lot of fuses…
I also have a Beckman Industrial 223 that has a feature I have never seen anywhere else. You can select a tone that has the pitch of the display value. 0.000 low tone 1.999 high tone. I use it a lot to check cables and continuity. You do not have to look at the display every time you probe a connection and you can keep you eyes on the board. You also can “hear” if the resistance is different on one or two of the connections. You can also hear if a DC voltage is stable or if there is some variation with different loads. As Dave would say “I like that”. It is also very small compared to the Fluke 87 or the Metrahit Metrawatt series.

Ah, thanks, that explains it!

I had one of these meter in my hands last month and is really felt like i could throw it out of the first story window and use is afterwards, and i also got that warm feeling when turning the range knob.

I love the physical barriers that move into place when in Amps range. When leads are installed I am guessing that it can’t be switched to the incorrect setting without first removing the leads but I am wondering if some heavy handed electrician will snap the internal mechanism while turning the dial, unless it is built nice and beefy.

It strikes me as odd that they go to all the trouble of sealing the unit. Putting gaskets on the back shell, the fuse compartment, the battery compartment. They go with IR to transmit data to the outside world. I wouldn’t doubt that the range dial and buttons also has some type of gasket built into them. Then they go and stick an open DC jack right on top of the unit with no protection to keep the elements out. The meter is a sports car with the sunroof stuck in the open position.

If this thing is used outside even some light rain will find its way inside thanks to the funnel right on the top of the device! I would think the DC jack should have been somewhere else other than the top and have a rubber seal on it…

One thing I felt that was missing from the review (and it’s a very simple thing really) is… how do you switch it on and off? I noticed the button at the top right had on|off written on it, but I wasn’t sure if this was referring to just the backlight.

The reason I think this question is so relevant is because personally I really hate it when a multimeter has the on/off function built in to the range switch. To hijack one of your Daveisms, it really ticks me off!!!
Why? Well because the increased usage on the range switch just to turn it on and off causes extra wear and tear, which then results in premature failures with the instrument. And aside from that it’s just annoying to have to wrench the range selector around every time you turn it on and you want a function that’s on the other side of the selector (although from the looks of it, you’d actually enjoy that!)

So yeah… how do you turn it on and off? Is it a dual function with the backlight on/off?

Brian

I think Dave is hooked on Meter Porn

Nice Meter, I will have to look at who sells them in Au.

Not that I have any money, but I like to dream

Santa might be nice one year.

Regards,

Kat.

I have a 25 year old Metrawatt Metravo D1. It was a Christmas present from my parents when I went to technical school then. It has the same probes. And after 25 years I still like them. Good to see that Gossen Metrawatt holds up the tradition of having probes for real men with big hands and not this tiny toy stuff

They directly fit into German wall plugs. They are great on the bench, too. I don’t remember how often I need to look for a 2mm to 4mm adapter, or an additional measurement lead to connect a meter ground to the 4mm power supply ground. Not with the Metrawatt probes.

I have yet to find a meter company where the PC software is not ridiculous, either because of the price or because of the quality, and often because of both. I often have the feeling that PC software is an afterthought. It is either done by some underfunded inhouse department, or even worse, by some employee who happened to have a free copy of Visual Basic, or outsourced to some uninterested, untalented company.