I replaced the negative battery cable a few years ago and I replaced both battery cable clamps with the style that you don't like a couple years ago. They have been sealed with liquid electric tape until a couple days ago when I was trying to test them.

The negative cable shows 0 ohms from the clamp to the block.
The negative battery cables clamp (by that I mean that I'm not putting it in the wire but against the battery clamp so if there was an issue with the pinched battery cable then it should show here) to the ground bolt beside the e-brake pedal shows 0 ohms.

The negative battery clamp to the ground next to the e-brake at the tab shows 0 ohms.

The ground next to the e-brake shows 0 ohms from the bolt to the tab, from the bolt to the dashboard frame behind the knee blocker and from the tab to the dashboard frame.

I really believe the root of all my issues is from those corroded battery posts.
I've started the truck a couple times since cleaning them and played with the lights and radio but I still haven't driven it. It seems fine for now.

I ordered the fuses I need from Fluke since I can't find them locally so it'll be a while before I can test the IOD amperage.

 

I believe that there's something up with that meter for, nothing is zero ohms. It would show >0.02 OHM so, if that was what you're referring to as "zero" then, the reading is correct. Even with the meter zeroed out, it will still show something as far as resistance is concerned.

SIMPLE TEST to verify meter is working properly:

- Set the DMM to continuity

- Short probes (this means, touch them together)

<IF> it beeps, it's working but, we need to run one additional test to verify resistance of the meter itself.

<IF> it does not beep, the fuse is blown.

NEXT TEST: DMM OHM TEST

- Set DMM to OHM

- Short probes

RESULT: Test meter should show ~ 0.2 OHM to 0.5 OHM and >. It WILL NOT read zero (0.00) OHM.

<IF> reading = 0 (zero) The fuse is blown.

CM

 

It may have been that, surely. A battery coming and going from the system tends to wig things out and jerk your system voltages all over the map -- a live system seeing tens or hundreds of amps surging this way and that is very different from a quiescent system seeing the tiny currents from an ohmmeter.

I've had good luck finding oddball test equipment fuses at, of all places, Radio Shack. I carry a very old Simpson lineman's multimeter (one of the pocket sized analog jobbies that comes with an AC current clamp that can be stuck to the top of it, and a shunt for DC current > 300mA, too) in my truck and had a popped fuse in there for the longest time, then one day just for giggles I went into a Radio Shack and they actually had the silly thing. But Radio Shacks are hit and miss and generally best avoided when there's an alternative.

I hope the problem truly is long gone and never to return.

 

The meter reads 0 ohms when the probes are put together.
The meter beeps and after about 5 seconds the numbers drop to 0.
The only fuses in it are for the amp and miliamp settings.

The Fluke also shows 0 ohms and beeps when the probes are connected.

Radio shack didn't have my fuses. They had the 10A fuse in the right size but it was 600v instead of 1000v. Then they had another that was a slow blow fuse.

The guy I talked to at Fluke mentioned that the Fluke 113 is one of the best when it comes to meters under 100$, do y'all think I should look into getting one of those?

 

What you've got there is a Fluke 17 -- the only place to get one in the US was Sears, AFAIK. If it works, WTF stick with it.

A quick 'n' dirty "hello is this thing on" check of the ohmmeter: Grab a probe between the thumb and forefinger of each hand. You should see some tens of k-ohms. Squeeze harder, the number should drop. Let up gradually, it should increase. If that happens, the meter's not hard broke. You'll want to get your fuses in place and retest before throwing it away if that doesn't work.

For the occasional user doing mostly automotive work, any multimeter that gives reasonably accurate numbers will do just fine. Myself, I buy only Fluke (digital) and Simpson (analog) multimeters and have been that way for 30 years without regret, so you've got the right name in mind, anyway. I haven't ever held a 113 in my hand or paid any attention to its specs, but it's probably just fine for what you might ask of it.

 

FLuke, fluke fluke and nothing but Fluke. 113s are good. No meter that I have used to date other than some very expensive models with special probes and connectors measure zero OHM.

The probes and leads themselves have resistance to more / lesser degree and, depending on the quality of the meter, it's going to either be higher or lower but, never zero UNLESS- it's scale is not set FINE enough in AUTO mode.

In AUTO mode, sometimes (by default) the scale goes to no decimal places. So, you don't see that .0005 or. 0.05 or 0.5 OHM readings.

I do own a beater meter by the way for real s-h-i-t jobs where, I fear my good meters from being compromised or ruined and, as beat as it is, it still suffices. I know the magnitude of error and know how to compensate for it.

I want you to run another test on that meter and, this is the last one.

TEST: STATIC LOAD TEST

Go to Radio Hack and take your meter with you. Or, if too embarrassed, buy some resistors and measure them at home. Buy a pack that is of the same value say, 1K OHM. That's 1000 OHM resistors.

Set the meter to OHM

Place a probe on one lead and the other probe on the other lead. Note resistance measurement on the display.

Meter should display 1000 OHM or 1.00K + ~, >.05 OHM

Try that and get back.

CM

 

I didn't know until finally I got one in my hand that there was such a thing as a DMM without auto-zero. A good DMM has a button on it for that. You short the leads, poke the AutoZero button, and bingo: 0.000.

+/- .05 ohms??? Nah... +/- 0.05k maybe, or maybe +/- 0.10k, or maybe +/- 0.20k, but nowhere is he going to find +/-0.05 ohms. There's never been such a device made, to my knowledge.

If ya go that route, Sheriff, a 1k resistor will have a brown band at one end, and you start reading from there. You'll have brown, black, black, red, then either gold, silver, or nothing. If it's gold, it's +/-5% or 0.05k (950-1050 ohms). If it's silver, it's +/-10%, so 0.10k (900-1100 ohms). No band at all is 20%, or 0.20k (800-1200 ohms).

Never thought I'd catch ya, C.

 

I disagree here. I work with these tools everyday as an engineer in high tech environments and, I'm not going to get into another round of this. Let's not even go here. For someone who didn't realize that there was meters that had no zero out capability, well, I'm going to stop before I say something I shouldn't. I have to force myself to stop now.

 

I meant no offense or disrespect in my last post. I just assumed that an innocent and normal enough typo or thinko had interfered with your presentation of your thoughts, and I didn't want to see Sheriff420 throwing away his DMM because his 1k+/-10% resistor measured a perfectly acceptable 993 ohms rather than in the range 999.95 - 1000.05.

Until you got pissed off about it, I'd assumed you'd simply made an innocent mistake of the sort we all make from time to time. Now I'm suspending judgment.

Aw, why not? I'm grinnin' like a drunk monkey and taking none of it seriously. I'm surprised that a fellow engineer would become emotional over this kind of thing.

Surely, as an engineer, you can appreciate the great value of peers who will hold you to the highest standards. I surely do. When I make a slip on the keyboard that changes the meaning of my words, make noise about it so I will learn to be more careful for everyone present and that poor clod who comes along five years from now so they won't be misled by my mistake. If I expose ignorance, enlighten me so that I and everyone else, including that future clod, can learn. If I won't learn, at least try so those who are listening/reading along might. I've never known even one engineer who didn't operate in this way by the time he or she got out of college.

I wouldn't want to work in an environment where these things weren't practiced. I wouldn't want to participate in this forum if these things were not practiced here.

I never worked at a place that made me use low-budget TME. Even the economical Fluke 8050A that's long out of production had a "Ref" button that could be used to zero the meter prior to taking low-value resistance/continuity measurements. And for making differential voltage or current measurements. Or for messing with the operator's head by poking it when he wasn't looking.

I encountered my first non-zeroing DMM in 1988 or 1989 when a neighbor bought one from Radio Shack. I was helping him troubleshoot a broken Heathkit 2kW HF amp (that he picked up at a flea market) and he handed the cheesy DMM to me -- the first thing I did was short the leads and look for the autozero button that it didn't have. A few months later he threw it in his automotive toolbox and bought a real DMM for his bench after he discovered the cheap handheld had 10x more precision than accuracy.

Grand idea. Don't get emotionally distressed over a simple conversation on a web forum. I meant no offense, I truly didn't. You're using a graphical web browser, right? You saw the winky emoticon?

Enough apologizing, time to have fun. Take it like a man. The practice won't hurt much.

K = degrees Kelvin, k = prefix indicating 1*10^3 ... surely I'm not the only one here who knows this?

Ohm is not spelled in all caps. It's a guy's name. So are Hertz, Henry, and Gauss. Farad isn't, but it's shortened from Faraday, and we don't spell it in all caps either. UHF is in all caps, but only because we named it after the Norwegian janitor who was always spilling our coffee, so we always yelled his name. "UHF! You clumsy fool! Watch where you're swinging that mop!"

Well, okay, I made the last one up. Some time after I left school they started the "Education Should Be Fun" campaign and I just happen to agree with the concept.

1k or any other value +/- 0.00005% is still a resistor I really, really want to see. Perfectly honestly, I'd spend the better part of a day playing with it. Or would if I could find an ohmmeter with that kind of accuracy, anyway. I have no idea how the thermal noise in the components might be overcome to accomplish that, but I'd surely love to see it.

Consider thy chain playfully yanked, friend. No harm was meant and no ill will is harbored. Cheer TFU. Smile.

 

My meter has 4 numbers. When I touch something to check the resistance the decimal dances across all four numbers and settles on 000.0 if it doesn't show any resistance.

I already have a pack of 4.7 Ohm resistors that I got to bypass the security chip on my Camaro.
Two of them measure 4.59 Ohms, one reads 4.6 Ohms and one reads 3.266 Ohms.

Edit before I post, the one with the lower value has different bands. It goes gold/red/orange/orange.

The other three are gold/red/purple/yellow.

I just went out there and tested my fuel injectors for a better idea of what my meter is telling me. All but #5 and #7 show 12.5 Ohms. I didn't test #5 and #7 because I have zip ties on them because the little red lock is missing and I haven't gotten around to replacing them yet. Aim4squirrels gave me a link to get new pigtails for the injectors too, I need to get a few ordered.