Fluke 29/79-2 and 87-3 Fuse Question

[ogdento]

Hi folks,
I have Fluke 29, 79-2 and 87-3 meters... the 79-2 and 29 use the Bussman 1A and 15A fuses, whereas the 87-3 uses the Bussmann 0.44A and 11A fuses.

The 29/79-2 current ranges are 40mA and 10A, and the 87-3 ranges are 400mA and 10A.  I don't really understand why the 29/79-2 fuse specs are so much higher than the meter ranges allow, but that's getting off topic.

Newark, Digikey, etc sell 5-packs of Fluke fuses... is there any safety hazard in using the 87-3 spec'd fuses (0.44A and 11A) in the 29/79-2?

I did see a Fluke note saying not to use the 15A 29/79-2 fuse in the 87-3 (which makes sense to me), but I couldn't come up with any reason the 87-3 fuses wouldn't be ok in the 29/79-2.

Thanks

[ModemHead]

The 11A/0.44A fuses are kind of a defacto standard nowadays for multimeter fuses, so you're good there.  The specs for the 79/29-II meters allow for a 30-second overload of 20A on the 10A range.  The 11A fuse might blow in that situation, whereas the 15A wouldn't.  Other than that, and without diving into the spec sheets, I think it would be OK to sub the fuses.

[Fungus]

is there any safety hazard in using the 87-3 spec'd fuses (0.44A and 11A) in the 29/79-2?

Replacing with a lower breaking current should be OK.

[ogdento]

awesome, thanks for the info guys.

ModemHead I can't tell you how many times I've checked out the awesome stuff you've done with Flukes... love your site!