I'm curious as to what other's preferred method is to test uA with an inexpensive multimeter? Thanks in Advance!

 

In series with the load, maybe?

 

How many uA? What is the nature of the circuit?

The shunt resistance of many meters on the 200uA scale is 1k ohm. Would that be enough to affect the circuit?

 

I need to measure a low power circuit (5-100uA)
I usually test with a dummy resistor load and verify with a scope.

 

What is the current range you want to measure?
Would a shunt resistor in series with you circuit that causes a 200mV drop at full load be a problem?

 

Get yourself a .1 Ohm of appropriate wattage in series with your load and then just measure voltage.

 

Get yourself a .1 Ohm of appropriate wattage in series with your load and then just measure voltage.

That only works for measuring μA if you have a microvolt meter.

 

I'm curious as to what other's preferred method is to test uA with an inexpensive multimeter? Thanks in Advance!

I need to measure a low power circuit (5-100uA)
I usually test with a dummy resistor load and verify with a scope.

I will assume DC current. You can buy a DC uA analog panel meter relatively inexpensive and place it in series with your load. Really depends on how accurate you need to be or to what uncertainty is good enough.

Ron

 

That only works for measuring μA if you have a microvolt meter.

Oh missed the uA part.

 

Years ago I bought Dave Jones' µCurrent gizmo - it works very well on any general purpose multimeter.

However, since then I have got a few 5-1/2 digit bench meters (Keithley 191, Racal Dana 5001) that turn any precision 1Ω or 10Ω resistor into a very reasonable way of measuring µA with low dropout..