Is NON-CONTACT VOLTAGE feature worth it?

[5U4GB]

I got a cheap NCV probe from Aliexpress I think it was $1 possibly a Fluke knockoff. Hmmm it didn't work very good at all, poor sensitivity. Took it apart, the problem is the probe tip was missing the metal flag and somebody put a resistor lead in place. It uses a 74HC14 and very high Z input impedance 12x22MEG (264MEG) to GND. Works great now.

I use a Klein NCVT3 (watch out for the gimmicky ones they added later like the -4 and -5) which is pretty decent and fixes some of the problems very early versions had, e.g. not having an it's-switched-on indicator so you wouldn't know whether it wasn't detecting anything or wasn't even on, it also has an LED bargraph showing the strength of the field and from teardowns is a lot better engineered than a lot of the few-dollars Aliexpress ones.

The most important thing to remember about them though is to always check on a live circuit first before using it to test whatever you're testing.  To be extra safe, bracket the test, so live circuit, circuit being tested, live circuit again.

[jonpaul]

Simon: A VOM/DVM is not as useful  as a separate NC probe a
For mains and HV  work we use the excellent  non contact Fluke probes 1AC II 1000V https://www.fluke.com/en-us/product/electrical-testing/basic-testers/fluke-1ac-ii

Best handheld overall DVM is Fluke 87: The 187, 287 are not as reliable and the screens have a questionable uggedness .


 I bought Fluke 87  V  $175 LN w/ test leads and case. Very satisfied. Assembled in USA.
CAT III 600V CAT IV 1000V.

Cheers!

Jon

[shapirus]

I got a cheap NCV probe from Aliexpress I think it was $1 possibly a Fluke knockoff. Hmmm it didn't work very good at all, poor sensitivity. Took it apart, the problem is the probe tip was missing the metal flag and somebody put a resistor lead in place. It uses a 74HC14 and very high Z input impedance 12x22MEG (264MEG) to GND. Works great now.

An NCV probe can be relatively easily DIY'ed btw, with any level of sensitivity desired (and/or with an adjustable sensitivity), and that will very likely end up being better than most of dedicated or DMM NCV probes. I think it may even make sense to add a 50/60 Hz band pass filter to only trigger on the mains-induced field. The only problem is finding a suitable case, but if you can find a sufficiently thick pen, it'll probably do. It's going to be an interesting project to design a PCB that fits there just right.

[5U4GB]

Or get the cheapest Ali one that looks about right, rip the guts out, and replace it with your own circuit.

[shapirus]

Or get the cheapest Ali one that looks about right, rip the guts out, and replace it with your own circuit.

Lol yes, may very well end up being cheaper than a pen, let alone a dedicated DIY case.

[Majorassburn]

Brymen actually makes meters that are sold under the Amprobe and Fluke names, as well as Greenlee which is their biggest label.

Really?  I Didn't know that Danaher/Fortive used Brymen for their Fluke & Amprobe DMM's...wasn't aware of that.  Specifically, which Fluke or Amprobe DMM's are made by Brymen?

Hi, again. When you can, please let me know which Fluke & Amprobe meters are made by Brymen? I knew about Greenlee but not the others. Thanks for the info.

[bdunham7]

Hi, again. When you can, please let me know which Fluke & Amprobe meters are made by Brymen? I knew about Greenlee but not the others. Thanks for the info.

You'd have to search past threads, examples have been posted.  Mostly current clamp meters IIRC, perhaps some other products.  These are not just rebadged Brymen products like with Greenlee.  It appears that Fluke is using Brymen as an OEM for Fluke-specific products.  Somewhere there's a photo of a disassembled Fluke clamp meter with a "BTC" mark on its main chip, so you can make of that what you wish.

[Majorassburn]

Hi, again. When you can, please let me know which Fluke & Amprobe meters are made by Brymen? I knew about Greenlee but not the others. Thanks for the info.

You'd have to search past threads, examples have been posted.  Mostly current clamp meters IIRC, perhaps some other products.  These are not just rebadged Brymen products like with Greenlee.  It appears that Fluke is using Brymen as an OEM for Fluke-specific products.  Somewhere there's a photo of a disassembled Fluke clamp meter with a "BTC" mark on its main chip, so you can make of that what you wish.

Thanks for that info.  Although, what you said was that they made Fluke & Amprobe meters which, according to Fluke Sales is not true. That's why I was so curious.

I can believe that Fluke & Amprobe might source chips from Brymen and whoever else makes what they're looking for but, that's a long way from making their meters.

As you know, Fluke makes a big deal about their meters being assembled in the USA. To have a Taiwanese company like Brymen make them and then for Fluke and Amprobe to sell them as USA-assembled would be quite surprising and dishonest especially because they are GSA-qualified vendors to the U.S. Government and Brymen-made meters with a Fluke or Amprobe brand label on them would not qualify under those same GSA rules.

I really like the Brymen 869s but their AC accuracy spec is crappy and makes the LSD useless. Maybe I'll take a shot at one anyway. I like their features overall when I can figure out what they cost in USD$.

Thanks again for your response.

[shapirus]

I really like the Brymen 869s but their AC accuracy spec is crappy and makes the LSD useless.

It's almost exactly the same as, for example, the Fluke 289's AC spec. Very little difference over the entire range of voltages and frequencies, with one being slightly better in one area and slightly worse in another.

"Crappy" is relative. What are we comparing it with?

[HKJ]

AC specs is always crappy compared to DC specs and there is a very good reason for that (If you know the math you know why).

I like good non-contact detectors, but have never seen a DMM with that and very few loose detectors that live up to that. Generally it is easy to make a non-contact detector, but it is hard to make one that only alarms when it is pointed at a single live wire with mains voltage.

[floobydust]

Hi, again. When you can, please let me know which Fluke & Amprobe meters are made by Brymen? I knew about Greenlee but not the others. Thanks for the info.

You'd have to search past threads, examples have been posted.  Mostly current clamp meters IIRC, perhaps some other products.  These are not just rebadged Brymen products like with Greenlee.  It appears that Fluke is using Brymen as an OEM for Fluke-specific products.  Somewhere there's a photo of a disassembled Fluke clamp meter with a "BTC" mark on its main chip, so you can make of that what you wish.

Thanks for that info.  Although, what you said was that they made Fluke & Amprobe meters which, according to Fluke Sales is not true. That's why I was so curious.

I can believe that Fluke & Amprobe might source chips from Brymen and whoever else makes what they're looking for but, that's a long way from making their meters.

As you know, Fluke makes a big deal about their meters being assembled in the USA. To have a Taiwanese company like Brymen make them and then for Fluke and Amprobe to sell them as USA-assembled would be quite surprising and dishonest especially because they are GSA-qualified vendors to the U.S. Government and Brymen-made meters with a Fluke or Amprobe brand label on them would not qualify under those same GSA rules.

I really like the Brymen 869s but their AC accuracy spec is crappy and makes the LSD useless. Maybe I'll take a shot at one anyway. I like their features overall when I can figure out what they cost in USD$.

Thanks again for your response.

There are shipping records showing full containers from Brymen TW to Fluke USA, plus that banana jack fiasco.
The myth that Fluke is what is used to be, surely dead by now.
Fortive is about maximum profit by milking an acquired legendary brand name - which means outsource as much as possible.
"Made in USA" definition changed, I would say only final test/cal at most is done in the Seattle to qualify for that claim.
My theory is that Brymen is locked out of North America by their OEM contracts.

Analog Devices closing LT plant and outsourcing means Fluke IC's ain't made in USA and surely have become very expensive runs.

[bdunham7]

Thanks for that info.  Although, what you said was that they made Fluke & Amprobe meters which, according to Fluke Sales is not true. That's why I was so curious.

I can believe that Fluke & Amprobe might source chips from Brymen and whoever else makes what they're looking for but, that's a long way from making their meters.

As you know, Fluke makes a big deal about their meters being assembled in the USA. To have a Taiwanese company like Brymen make them and then for Fluke and Amprobe to sell them as USA-assembled would be quite surprising and dishonest especially because they are GSA-qualified vendors to the U.S. Government and Brymen-made meters with a Fluke or Amprobe brand label on them would not qualify under those same GSA rules.

No.  I'm saying the Brymen actually ships complete, assembled, tested, boxed products with printed manuals to Fluke for sale under both their Fluke and Amprobe name.  Fluke doesn't claim that those products are "Made in the USA" and they accurately list their origin as "Taiwan".   AFAIK, this does not apply to any Fluke-branded industrial line handheld meters, but note that many of those meters are now labelled "Assembled in the USA" as opposed to "Made in..." as they were before.  Since many of those models are made (by Fluke) and sold in China with a 'C' after the model number, I'll leave it to your imagination how much assembly is actually done in the USA at this point.  Fluke is a global company--which is fine, good for them--and they make no representations otherwise.  I've never alleged any dishonesty on their part.  FWIW, they have other models, like the 11x series, that may be assembled in Malaysia, Singapore or wherever.  I bought a 116/323 combo kit a while back and the 116 says "Made in Malaysia" while the 323 says "Assembled in Malaysia". 

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/repair/dead-brymen-bm869s/msg3606703/#msg3606703

I haven't seen any Fluke models that appear to be outright rebadged Brymens, but there are Amprobe and FLIR (different company) models that appear different but internally they are identical to a Brymen original model.  There's been endless discussion of this, you can search the forum for Amprobe 140, Amprobe 14/15 and FLIR DM64.

On the bright side, my "Assembled in the USA" replacement 289, which I presume is a 289C that was just screwed together here in the US and probably has a made-and-calibrated in China PCB, seems to be just as good if not slightly better than the old "Made in the USA" model.

[floobydust]

I think my gripe is the 'Made in USA' pricing that Fortive continues to uphold, despite outsourcing parts.
I despise mega-conglomerates buying up great brand names, then slashing costs and destroying the brand. They decimate engineering, R&D and manufacturing- outsource as much as possible and cater to investors. No innovation allowed. Fortive stock to the moon!

Low cost Fluke non-contact voltage probe out in 2009 but 03/2010 recalled Fluke VoltAlert Voltage Detector 1AC-A1- then they fixed it.

Model T-2 recalled over crashing and hanging up for 8 minutes eek, then recalled again over bad battery contacts. "Fluke is aware of two incidents involving these testers where consumers received a mild electric shock."
So that's another danger with these NCV probes is you have to check if they work.

P.S. Just noticed 87-V recall mfg. dates June 7, 2019 – August 26, 2021. Outsourcing those input jack plastics now? lol "...may have plastic material intrusion in the COM input terminal. " Two years to notice 
They used to do the plastics, injection molding in Everett. Next door to Boeing. I wonder if there are tours of the plant to dispel things.

[nightfire]

Fluke are seriously overpriced. A 179 now goes for £450 when a few years ago it was £250, you are literally buying a pantone colour.

I would like to give some other angle to this: It always depends who is using the device for what work- so the tool should be suited for the work it needs to do.
This said, I work at my job with a Fluke 179, I privately own for my own tinkering a Fluke 45, 8600 and 8020, as well as an Agilent U1272A, and have seen some other stuff around the years.

For lots of people especially nowadays with the asked prices Fluke is overpriced- simply because they do not need or use the features Fluke can offer over the competition.
But if you work in an industrial environment, where you really have to see that your inhouse electricians are able to work and fix machinery (responding to problems that cause outages in production etc.), you want to have a certain level of build quality, robustness and stability, because you really need to trust the readings- and you need fast calibration services so that you minimize downtime for your staff resp. minimize the number of spare multimeters you have to keep for times like a DMM being away for calibration...
Also in industry certificates matters much, and might be in case of accidents vital to prove that you have done your due diligence in choosing quality tools.
Also, for some people the "made in USA" mattters much, and some of them are obligated (like military) to not buy from non-domestic sources.

Actually, with the knowledge I have now, AND if I would not have had a good deal on my used U1272A, I probably would have gone for something like a Brymen 867 back then as I was equipping my small bench at home. (the Brymen 786 was not available back then). I also thought about going for a used Fluke 87V, but I quickly realized that due to the resolution it would be not really good for electronics work.

[nightfire]

I tried to resist commenting here but my weakness of character prevented me from remaining silent. 

A few rules to LIVE by when working around lethal voltages with a DMM:
1)  Above 240V, DO NOT USE A DMM!!!
2)  Below 240V, USE A FLUKE!!!
3)  Chinese DMM's & Brymens are fine for ELECTRONICS but NOT MAINS ELECTRICITY.

I have been shocked and burned several times in my life by 120V, 240V and burned by 25KV in older TV's and I can tell you that it is no fun.

As for NCV, as another poster before me has said, "NCV is just a convenient preliminary indicator, that's it."  And, That's really it.

Sorry, I just couldn't help myself! 

A bit late to that party, but I would like to say that above statements are quite biased and probably have to be interpreted what they really should express...

1) Above safety voltage, please be aware of what you are doing and follow proper procedure to ensure safe working. Here in germany this would mean, according to code: There are the so called "5 safety rules", that loosely translate to: 1) disconnect equipment, 2) make sure it can not accidentally connected again, 3) measure for absence of voltage. And for 3) according to code you HAVE to use a two-pole voltage tester to prevent misreadings and other accidents caused by improper usage of a DMM here. Synonym for this i germany is the brand name "Duspol": https://www.benning.de/produkte/pruef-und-messtechnik/pruefgeraete-spannungspruefer/spannungspr%C3%BCfer-duspol.html

1a) DMMs have their justification for voltages above 240V: In industrial environments, you sometimes have to measure things like working on a 400V 3phase motor. I myself used a DMM to confirm some imbalance on the output of a 80kVA UPS system caused by a improper seated current transformer. And yes, working in CAT IV environment here.

2) Depending on what the task is, Fluke DMM are of high build quality, sure. I would say, that generally you should use good quality equipment and make sure it is suited for the task at hand. Depending on what your requirements are, in some cases even cheap quality chinese DMMs might be used without problems...

3) Regarding electrical safety, I trust the chinese DMMs usually as far as I can throw them, which is not much... Brymen on the other hand has a certain track record of building good quality devices, that are UL marked and also get tested by independent sources like J. Smith here in this forum.
I personally do trust the following brands for mains work: Fluke, Keysight/Agilent, Hioki, Gossen, Brymen. Other brands surely apply, but I have not used them (yet).


That said I would ask another question: Does anyone has reliable data of how well and stable the recent Brymen DMMs are? With Fluke, especially older models, you experience decades-long stability regarding accuracy- my old Fluke 8600 still delivers good readings after 40 years... - Are there any reliable data regarding the stability of Brymen DMMs over, say, 10 years?
 

[5U4GB]

For checking in house electricity even Chinese UNI-T is good enough. Low energy.

In particular the UT18C is pretty decent and as you say should be fine for standard residential work.