Old Philips Fluke 97 / 96B (maybe others?)

[mos6502]

For $50, I'll take four ...

The ones I've looked at were way beyond that. I'll keep an eye out though.

[Scottjd]

For $50, I'll take four ...

The ones I've looked at were way beyond that. I'll keep an eye out though.

LolL, maybe the one I saw was for part only? I never did click on the full description. FYI, I've changed my comments about the battery pack also. I think the reason the last person who owned mine had a pack leak was because the charger in the 96B is so low powered and then does a trickle charge. The problem from what I'm reading a Ni-CD charger st a slow rate with trickle won't know when to stop giving a NIMH battery more charge. So it will overcharge the pack mine came with.
Scott

[joeqsmith]

$50 on eBay, wow!  I watched a 97 go the other day for $180.  No accessories.  I was looking at the temperature probe and people think that stupid thing is gold.    

The signal generator in the 97 is pretty much there just to cal the probes.  I am not sure what else you would use it for as it can't do much.   The slow ramp may be good for simulating sensors?   No idea what the sinewave was for.   

My plan was to use them in the garage.  As old as they are, I figure it will die at some point and I have a spare. 

I bought a NiMH charger with the C cells.  My go that direction and just plug them in when I need to use the scope.   

[joeqsmith]

On the newer 97, they dropped that keypad and integrated it into the PCB.   Wonder why Philips didn't do this from the start.

All back together now.   Here both 97s running with a loopback cable.  Hard to believe I scrubbed these in the sink. 

Does the 96 have FFT?  What about AC+DC? What about Power measurements?   Math in the 97 is very limited. 

[mos6502]

Yeah, Fluke has a weird feature policy with those scope meters. E.g. the 123 doesn't have cursors. They want you to spend extra money and upgrade to the 124 to get cursors.

[Scottjd]

On the newer 97, they dropped that keypad and integrated it into the PCB.   Wonder why Philips didn't do this from the start.

All back together now.   Here both 97s running with a loopback cable.  Hard to believe I scrubbed these in the sink. 

Does the 96 have FFT?  What about AC+DC? What about Power measurements?   Math in the 97 is very limited.

Your cable does seem a lot shorter then mine. As for math, yes it has AC+DC, I have not seen FFT as an option yet, I think I've gone over the whole menu so I don't think it has it. Also it was marketed to the auto industry and they don't have much need for the FFT feature.

The manual has instructions for add, subtract, multiply, invert, intergrate, and filter, but in this section the manual has the 92B and 96B crossed off. I guess becuase the manual is for the 99B and 105B also.
I know the 99B and 105B does 5GS/s andnhas extra memory for recording and saving wave forms also.

As for power I can measure the current with a clamp as expected, see it as numerical or a wave form. But if I want to measure power with math function ii need the 99B or 105B again, not the 96B.

I wonder if I change out the memory flash chips, if I could flash the new firmware to include the math function. It would probably be easier to buy a broken 99 or 105 and change the flash chips. Their is only two of them from Intel. It would give me the software feature in the firmware, but not sure if it's running any other parts that might be different also. I guess the one problem with buying a broken unit is if someone hooked up the 12V programming voltage backwards then it would have fried that flash chip. Somit would be a gamble.

I'm thinking about buying some C cell rechargeables also, I think the one Ali-Ion charger I have already charges NiMh and Ni-cad but need to confirm this.
If it does then maybe I'll just break down the pack it came with.

[mahi]

The old 90 series ScopeMeters have some surprising features in comparison with the later 120 and 190 series. For example it can display up to 5 simultaneous measurements for a channel. The much newer 120 series can show only 2 simultaneous measurements per channel (primary + secondary or primary + cursor) and the much more expensive 190/190B/190C series is actually even worse: It can display only 2 measurements in total (two for one channel, one for each channel or one + cursor). The latter has been improved in the newest 190 Series II, though. The 120 series do not have any math capabilities although the 125 can do power measurements.

[joeqsmith]

Your cable does seem a lot shorter then mine. As for math, yes it has AC+DC, I have not seen FFT as an option yet, I think I've gone over the whole menu so I don't think it has it. Also it was marketed to the auto industry and they don't have much need for the FFT feature.

As for power I can measure the current with a clamp as expected, see it as numerical or a wave form. But if I want to measure power with math function ii need the 99B or 105B again, not the 96B.

I wonder if I change out the memory flash chips, if I could flash the new firmware to include the math function. It would probably be easier to buy a broken 99 or 105 and change the flash chips. Their is only two of them from Intel. It would give me the software feature in the firmware, but not sure if it's running any other parts that might be different also. I guess the one problem with buying a broken unit is if someone hooked up the 12V programming voltage backwards then it would have fried that flash chip. Somit would be a gamble.

I'm thinking about buying some C cell rechargeables also, I think the one Ali-Ion charger I have already charges NiMh and Ni-cad but need to confirm this.
If it does then maybe I'll just break down the pack it came with.

The cable is around 2".

I figured with yours being newer they would have the AC+DC.  That's nice! When I looked at the service manual, seemed the controller they used could have handled it.  Looks like a masked part.

There was a note about measuring power with the 97.  I think they were just talking about the multiply.  I was thinking with the newer ones they may have added enough math to handle at least 60Hz sort of signals.  Not that it would ever make a good power analyzer.

Strange you don't feel the automotive group would have much need for an FFT.   That one feature alone would be a great diagnostic tool to detect all sorts of problems.  At the tech level, it may need to be wrapped into some fancy software to make it easy for them to troubleshoot.  I agree that most techs would not know what it is, but they may have equipment that uses it.   

Buying eBay and used in general always has some risk.  On the plus side, most people who bought these would never touch the 12V programming pins.  They may drop them, throw wrenches at them in anger or spray them with break cleaner but not try can align them.      I plan to just use the thing.   

I was thinking to cut my pack apart as well.  I don't have a way to charge it and doubt the internal NiCad charger could handle it.   I bought 8 EBL batteries with their charger.  Their all charged up now and I'm planning to run some life tests with them next.   

Maybe that Bartterizer thing would work.  Switcher on switcher may gain us something 

[stj]

dont use the internal charger, on mine a fet shorted and because of a lack of fuses it blew a bunch of tracks, resisters etc off the power board!!! 

pissed me off so much i just threw it in a box and left it for over a decade! - maybe i will pull it out again now there is more service info around.

[Scottjd]

dont use the internal charger, on mine a fet shorted and because of a lack of fuses it blew a bunch of tracks, resisters etc off the power board!!! 

pissed me off so much i just threw it in a box and left it for over a decade! - maybe i will pull it out again now there is more service info around.

I wonder if this is what haolend to your second one Joe? Wouldn't surprise me. Mine had the leaky pack, sommaybe mine got lucky or they improved thencharger with the serries II B models.
Either way, the charger is not suitable for NIMH packs. I can't believe the one company sells so many of these NImH replacement packs. But  playing devils advocate if your in the shop using it every day you will probably rarely hit the full charge point on a 4500mA pack that would take 48 hours to fully charge (weekend off)  with the internal charger. So maybe that's why people haven't complained, or noticed. Me, I know I won't use it every day so the risk is higher.

I think the internal charger would be OK if you find a Ni-cad pack replacement. I did find one on Amazon for half the cost of the NMHd pack, about $15. But I also had a leaking failed pack, I should ask my friend if he still had it. I'm curious to know if this pack was the original Ni-cad or a newer NMHD packs that failed. It will give me a clue if any damage was done to the charging circuit.

[Scottjd]

The cable is around 2".

I figured with yours being newer they would have the AC+DC.  That's nice! When I looked at the service manual, seemed the controller they used could have handled it.  Looks like a masked part.

There was a note about measuring power with the 97.  I think they were just talking about the multiply.  I was thinking with the newer ones they may have added enough math to handle at least 60Hz sort of signals.  Not that it would ever make a good power analyzer.

Strange you don't feel the automotive group would have much need for an FFT.   That one feature alone would be a great diagnostic tool to detect all sorts of problems.  At the tech level, it may need to be wrapped into some fancy software to make it easy for them to troubleshoot.  I agree that most techs would not know what it is, but they may have equipment that uses it.   

Buying eBay and used in general always has some risk.  On the plus side, most people who bought these would never touch the 12V programming pins.  They may drop them, throw wrenches at them in anger or spray them with break cleaner but not try can align them.      I plan to just use the thing.   

I was thinking to cut my pack apart as well.  I don't have a way to charge it and doubt the internal NiCad charger could handle it.   I bought 8 EBL batteries with their charger.  Their all charged up now and I'm planning to run some life tests with them next.   

Maybe that Bartterizer thing would work.  Switcher on switcher may gain us something 

You have a point, they probably are using FFT but it's built into a snapon device with s different GUI and sold selerate from the scope so they have to buy more tools. A few of my friends are mechanics, and I once when I mentioned FFT he looked at me weird because he didn't know what I was talking about. These days with cars having 23 different computers I'm sure many features on a modern scope woild come in handy. But diagnostically they are used to plug and play with the ODBD II plug and go.....

Good point also about the 12 programming flash being ok. As for the break fluid, it's all good. I have break cleaner so I can fix that one 

I think the batterizer will  definitely help out with the parasitic drain when the units and standby. We should buy a couple, oh wait they haven't sold them yet. I wonder what's holding them up?

Let me know how the new batteries work for you. I did see something in the manual for a mode you can use to turn on the unit to refresh the battery. It sounded like it just disabled the sleep timer and the battery voltage detection. If the battery is under s certain level it won't attempt to charge it unless you use this mode. They said to drain it under this mode, then charge, then repeate 5 times.
Well if your has this mode you could set up a Time lapse to determine the run time with the new batteries.

I forgot my eneloops came with a AA to C cell adapter, the AA are rated for 2000mA. Maybe I should try this, I should be able to get 4 hours out of it, maybe. And I own about 16 AA and 8 AAA eneloops with two charger already.

[joeqsmith]

dont use the internal charger, on mine a fet shorted and because of a lack of fuses it blew a bunch of tracks, resisters etc off the power board!!! 

pissed me off so much i just threw it in a box and left it for over a decade! - maybe i will pull it out again now there is more service info around.

I wonder if this is what haolend to your second one Joe? Wouldn't surprise me. Mine had the leaky pack, sommaybe mine got lucky or they improved thencharger with the serries II B models.
Either way, the charger is not suitable for NIMH packs. I can't believe the one company sells so many of these NImH replacement packs. But  playing devils advocate if your in the shop using it every day you will probably rarely hit the full charge point on a 4500mA pack that would take 48 hours to fully charge (weekend off)  with the internal charger. So maybe that's why people haven't complained, or noticed. Me, I know I won't use it every day so the risk is higher.

I think the internal charger would be OK if you find a Ni-cad pack replacement. I did find one on Amazon for half the cost of the NMHd pack, about $15. But I also had a leaking failed pack, I should ask my friend if he still had it. I'm curious to know if this pack was the original Ni-cad or a newer NMHD packs that failed. It will give me a clue if any damage was done to the charging circuit.

There are several 7.5V back to back zeners that are part of the input protection.  These are what was damaged.  Someone hooked it up to something they shouldn't have.   The cable was just a quick removal and clean.  I think this was just age and heat cycling in the garage that did it in.  The other problem with this meter is the rubber gaskets are starting to fail.  Maybe from age, maybe from the break cleaner.       It's also missing the boot.  Too bad they don't have parts available for these.  I would consider getting a new shell for one with a lens and keep one as a shelf queen. 

For the FFT, I could see looking at vibration.  Real fun would be to look at crank position with an index.  Image, you could see every stroke and know how each compares.  I'm not a mechanic and really have no idea what is out there for tools now.   You can't get to everything with the CAN. 

I already received my Baterizers.  Just don't ask me to post any pictures of them.      Talk about a scam but I have seen a lot worse.

Let me know how the new batteries work for you. I did see something in the manual for a mode you can use to turn on the unit to refresh the battery. It sounded like it just disabled the sleep timer and the battery voltage detection. If the battery is under s certain level it won't attempt to charge it unless you use this mode. They said to drain it under this mode, then charge, then repeate 5 times.
Well if your has this mode you could set up a Time lapse to determine the run time with the new batteries.

I looked in the manual and there is no mention of such a feature. 

[Scottjd]

Too many quotes in your last post to quote again, so I will just quote thus part "Someone hooked it up to something they shouldn't have". Hmm, maybe an electric flyswatter?

I've attached the part inwas refering to out of my manual that shows how to disable the battery save sleep mode. This may be just in the newer serries II firmware? But thought you could try it and see if it works on yours.
I looked up the battery save feature, another fancy way to say sleep timer. I was wrong before, it had nothing to do with preventing the charge of an over discharged pack. But it should allow it to stay on if it works for a run time test.

[joeqsmith]

Too many quotes in your last post to quote again, so I will just quote thus part "Someone hooked it up to something they shouldn't have". Hmm, maybe an electric flyswatter?

Maybe, but I doubt it.  I am guessing maybe the ignition output.   

I've attached the part inwas refering to out of my manual that shows how to disable the battery save sleep mode. This may be just in the newer serries II firmware? But thought you could try it and see if it works on yours.
I looked up the battery save feature, another fancy way to say sleep timer. I was wrong before, it had nothing to do with preventing the charge of an over discharged pack. But it should allow it to stay on if it works for a run time test.

The 97 will stay alive any time you are recording in meter or scope mode.

With the new pack in the meter, uncharged, it dropped about 260mv after 29 hours with the scope left off.  I then turned it on and left it.  It ran about an hour fifteen.   The high current draw when it is off will be a problem for me so it looks like I am going to charge and just store them until I need to use it.  Fully charged EBLs are in there now. 

Not a word from Fluke on the VHS tape.  It's only been a week.   

[Scottjd]

Too many quotes in your last post to quote again, so I will just quote thus part "Someone hooked it up to something they shouldn't have". Hmm, maybe an electric flyswatter?

Maybe, but I doubt it.  I am guessing maybe the ignition output.   

I've attached the part inwas refering to out of my manual that shows how to disable the battery save sleep mode. This may be just in the newer serries II firmware? But thought you could try it and see if it works on yours.
I looked up the battery save feature, another fancy way to say sleep timer. I was wrong before, it had nothing to do with preventing the charge of an over discharged pack. But it should allow it to stay on if it works for a run time test.

The 97 will stay alive any time you are recording in meter or scope mode.

With the new pack in the meter, uncharged, it dropped about 260mv after 29 hours with the scope left off.  I then turned it on and left it.  It ran about an hour fifteen.   The high current draw when it is off will be a problem for me so it looks like I am going to charge and just store them until I need to use it.  Fully charged EBLs are in there now. 

Not a word from Fluke on the VHS tape.  It's only been a week.

Well I guess and ignition coil throwing 20KV to 30KV would make more sense.

The manufacturer of the battery replied to me, they are sticking to the common math for charging rates of charging based off the capacity. So if it's a 1500mA capacity battery, the max charging rate would be 1.5A.
Of course charging at full speed does decrease the cycles of the battery lifetime.
Still don't trust that it's a real 4500mA batter. So I think I will top it off with 200mA slow charge, then drain it on my hobby charger at 300mA since the meter won't pull more then 300mA. Or maybe for mine a more accurate representation of drain woild be 200mA.

Scott

[joeqsmith]

Time lapse of the EBL 5000mA/h NiMH batteries... Made it a little over 7 hours.  More than enough for my needs.  Have two sets so I can ping pong between them. 

[Scottjd]

Nice, maybe that's the best way for me to go ask then. Was that with or without the light on yours.
I think you said without the light was about the same current draw as mine in full brightness.
Your batteries are 5000mA cells, the eneloops AA I have still the C converter is about 2000mA per cell.
So if you had your lights off, I think the eneloops would do about 3 hours with my light on low since I can't turn my light off. Three hours is good enough for me considering I own about 26 AA eneloops cells (RC transceivers take 6 to 8 at a time) and could carry two sets if needed giving me 6 hours. Way more then what I would need. I just need to see if Panasonic sell the adapters from AA to C selerate. Thenkot from Costco only came with 2 for C and 2 for D cell adaption.

[joeqsmith]

Nice, maybe that's the best way for me to go ask then. Was that with or without the light on yours.
I think you said without the light was about the same current draw as mine in full brightness.
Your batteries are 5000mA cells, the eneloops AA I have still the C converter is about 2000mA per cell.
So if you had your lights off, I think the eneloops would do about 3 hours with my light on low since I can't turn my light off. Three hours is good enough for me considering I own about 26 AA eneloops cells (RC transceivers take 6 to 8 at a time) and could carry two sets if needed giving me 6 hours. Way more then what I would need. I just need to see if Panasonic sell the adapters from AA to C selerate. Thenkot from Costco only came with 2 for C and 2 for D cell adaption.

That was all done with the backlight off.   FYI, if you look at the pictures, on the 97 when a function is active it highlights the text.  Not sure if your 96B works like that.   

I had seen the AA converters and thought about going this route as I have several of them.  Then I read one review for the packs we both have where a person said 15 minutes and another a half hour.  After reading those, I still ordered one and sprung for the highest capacity NiMH I could find. 

[Scottjd]

Nice, maybe that's the best way for me to go ask then. Was that with or without the light on yours.
I think you said without the light was about the same current draw as mine in full brightness.
Your batteries are 5000mA cells, the eneloops AA I have still the C converter is about 2000mA per cell.
So if you had your lights off, I think the eneloops would do about 3 hours with my light on low since I can't turn my light off. Three hours is good enough for me considering I own about 26 AA eneloops cells (RC transceivers take 6 to 8 at a time) and could carry two sets if needed giving me 6 hours. Way more then what I would need. I just need to see if Panasonic sell the adapters from AA to C selerate. Thenkot from Costco only came with 2 for C and 2 for D cell adaption.

That was all done with the backlight off.   FYI, if you look at the pictures, on the 97 when a function is active it highlights the text.  Not sure if your 96B works like that.   

I had seen the AA converters and thought about going this route as I have several of them.  Then I read one review for the packs we both have where a person said 15 minutes and another a half hour.  After reading those, I still ordered one and sprung for the highest capacity NiMH I could find.

Well I ran it last night with the backlights on the medium middle, all I have is low, medium and high.
So I chose medium and set it up for diod mode so it was putting out 3.7 Volts. Then wired a diod on the clams and it dropped to 0.480V, extended those leads to my Fluke 289 that also displayed 0.480V.
Started mid max on the 96B and record on the 289. I wasn't sure if the 96B would hold the timemof mid max if the batteries died. Turns out they both agreed at the end.
When I graphed the 289 you see the half a volt drop to zero assuming this is when the 86B turned off after 2 hours and 3 minutes.
Then I did a recal on the 96B and it agreed on the 2 hour run time. So for 4 eneloops AA 1900mA cells charged 4 hours before so they had time to settle.  Oh, and I checked the draw, it was 750mA draw when running on the batteries in the above mode.

Now that I know it holds the mid max before it turns off I set it up again with 4 eneloops last charged about 6 weeks ago, they all averaged about 1.33V. I set it up again on the middle lighting with it measuring the test signal from the Rigol scope and enabled mid max again. Let's see if scope mode does the same 2 hours as meter mode.

Oh, and I found several AA to C adapter for 3D printing. So no cost for those. I even found one that uses 2 AA in serries to a D cell adapter for double the capacity. I think I will print some of these out just to have them on hand, a just in case situation.

Scott

[joeqsmith]

Well I ran it last night with the backlights on the medium middle, all I have is low, medium and high.
So I chose medium and set it up for diod mode so it was putting out 3.7 Volts. Then wired a diod on the clams and it dropped to 0.480V, extended those leads to my Fluke 289 that also displayed 0.480V.
Started mid max on the 96B and record on the 289. I wasn't sure if the 96B would hold the timemof mid max if the batteries died. Turns out they both agreed at the end.
When I graphed the 289 you see the half a volt drop to zero assuming this is when the 86B turned off after 2 hours and 3 minutes.
Then I did a recal on the 96B and it agreed on the 2 hour run time. So for 4 eneloops AA 1900mA cells charged 4 hours before so they had time to settle.  Oh, and I checked the draw, it was 750mA draw when running on the batteries in the above mode.

Now that I know it holds the mid max before it turns off I set it up again with 4 eneloops last charged about 6 weeks ago, they all averaged about 1.33V. I set it up again on the middle lighting with it measuring the test signal from the Rigol scope and enabled mid max again. Let's see if scope mode does the same 2 hours as meter mode.

Oh, and I found several AA to C adapter for 3D printing. So no cost for those. I even found one that uses 2 AA in serries to a D cell adapter for double the capacity. I think I will print some of these out just to have them on hand, a just in case situation.

Scott

Ballpark, 17.9 * 0.2 / 4.8 = 746mA.  Yea, the 750 you measured seems right.   

Not sure putting two 1.2V cells in series to replace a 1.5V D is a good idea.  They do make some pretty decent D NiMH. 

Ha! Yea I ran into that problem with the 97.  I plugged it back into the charger at the end but my data was lost.  It may have ran 8 hours, I'm not sure.  Something over 7.  It appears your 96 may be the same physical size as the 97.  Maybe they share the same gaskets, boot and lenses.  Had a look on eBay for another junk one at a decent $50 price.  No such luck.  I'll try calling Fluke service and see if they have any stock on at least the gaskets. 

[stj]

you can buy the AA to C / D adapters from china for peanuts on ebay, no point wasting expensive polymers on them.

btw, when my 97 blew up, i was charging the factory pack - so the original charge circuit is crap - nothing to do with using over-capacity or different chemistry cells.
it does however have an extra contact on the pack - so it may charge them in pairs rather than a group of 4 - i'm not sure.

[joeqsmith]

you can buy the AA to C / D adapters from china for peanuts on ebay, no point wasting expensive polymers on them.

btw, when my 97 blew up, i was charging the factory pack - so the original charge circuit is crap - nothing to do with using over-capacity or different chemistry cells.
it does however have an extra contact on the pack - so it may charge them in pairs rather than a group of 4 - i'm not sure.

Did you blow it up using the Phillips wall transformer it came with it or did you swap that out?  Funny the ones I have are rated to 300mA but the meter can draw a little more than this. 

Almost forgot.  I looked at some of the owners original paperwork.  It appears the holster for the 90 series along with the 164 use the same part number PM 9083/001.  I assume they use the same gaskets as well.   

[stj]

i cant remember what transformer i used, but it was probably the right one because of the extended length connector.

[joeqsmith]

So I charged up (sort of) the green battery pack using the bench supply and it's been in the scope a few days.  I've been playing around with the scope and was surprised it had not failed yet. 

Snipped out about a 0.5" X 1" section of thin plastic.  Stuck some foil tape on both sides then wedged it between one of the connectors and the battery.   

When the 97 is off, it draws 184uA.  Much better than the 32mA I measured from the charge jack.    Once I turn it on, it draws 584mA (without the EL).  Seems a little low.  Makes sense now that the 5000mA/h batteries did so well.  Would be almost 9 hours.  Maybe once they have been cycled a few times, I'll measure it again and record the time using the PC so I don't have to watch it.

[Fraser]

Nice thread and an interesting read.

I still have a complete boxed 'as new' PM97 sitting in my lab. I have kept it in case it was ever needed but sadly it has never been out of the box except to test it. The Ni-Cad pack died long ago but it is is very easy to fit four standard Ni-Mh C cells and just add a small brass or copper strip that sits between the positive connection nipple and the charging tab that is below the battery. It is even easier with a tagged cell as the tag is sometimes long enough or may be extended to reach the charging tab.

I will be re-homing my lovely PM97 set soon and I am open to reasonable offers if someone wants an 'as new'example with all manuals leads and PSU. I also have the dinky little demo signal board that FLUKE manufactured for testing the Scopemeters. Finally I have a lot of the optional accessories and scope probes that FLUKE sold for these units. Really nice quality but sadly they never see use in my lab. If there is no serious interest here, I will list the bits in the Forum's For Sale' area where it really belongs, then onto eBay if no home is found on this forum.

Fraser
UK