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Capacitor ESR Meter - Recomendations

Tesla

May 10, 2010
168
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May 10, 2010
Messages
168
Last year I purchased a soldering rework station, so I thought now this year I will get my ESR meter.

Requirements:
Under $100, but useful and reliable.
Fully assembled and tested
In-circuit (I know … not best way) and out-of-circuit testing

Here is a good comparison (although a little dated)
http://www.anatekcorp.com/testequipment/esrcompar.htm

This one looks really good to me:
ESR Micro v4 - http://www.prc68.com/I/ESRmicro.shtml
The builder is Russian, so this link is easier to order/ship in US.

Some chatting about it:
http://www.badcaps.net/forum/showthread.php?t=7394&page=5&pp=20
Old Model v3 mini-review - http://preher-tech.com/esrmicro.aspx

Here is a similar one.
http://www.peakelec.co.uk/acatalog/jz_esr70.html
http://catalog.anatekcorp.com/viewProduct.cfm?item_id=736034

I would be interested to hear what you think of ESR Micro v4 or what you personally use.
 
Last edited:

Jimkarl

Aug 23, 2014
43
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Aug 23, 2014
Messages
43
I bought the ESR Micro V4 and loved it at first. but but i find the capacitance readings are WAY off all my 3 other good capacitor meters. Even though I'm well within supposed 1 year warranty period (bought in Jan 2017) sellers have been complete unresponsive to any (and multiple) emails for almost 2 months now. Cannot recommend them at all anymore.
 

(*steve*)

¡sǝpodᴉʇuɐ ǝɥʇ ɹɐǝɥd
Moderator
Jan 21, 2010
25,510
Joined
Jan 21, 2010
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25,510
Hahaha Chinese eBay seller and warranty? The only worse thing would be if they were Russian!

All joking aside, what short of errors are you getting in the capacitance measurements?
 

Jimkarl

Aug 23, 2014
43
Joined
Aug 23, 2014
Messages
43
It is an issue of accuracy. A couple months ago the beep volume got very (very) low. I assume the batteries needed changing even though it had only been used for about 3-4 months by that time (and lightly from a use perspective, not 8 hours a day or anything like that) but that did not resolve. Then I started to get uF measurements that just seemed on the low side so i compare to my previous capacitance meter (which was not an in circuit tester or esr, only capacitance) and found a fairly wide spread between the two. So I checked it again on two multimeters (one is a fluke) and all three of my other meters where withing a couple uf of each other, and the ESR micro was a good 20-40uf lower. As an example - a 220uf Cap reading 110-115 on my 3 other meters and 190 on this one. That is what I would called out of tolerance and I would have blindly thrown the cap out for a reading like that (as I have many times in the past, before realizing what was happening of course) Tried several different caps (old and new) and came to the definite conclusion that it simply isn't reading uF correctly anymore (unless all three of my other meters are broken - equally - which doesn't seem likely). And I always zero my leads before using. So if the uF reading is wrong I also have to wonder is the ESR reading is correct as well. Ironically, a few weeks back, the beep got louder again (hard to say if back to "normal" volume or not) so I did another recheck on the uF readings but no (positive) change there, still off on the values. There's no way for me to confirm the readings started to be bad when the beep volume disappeared, or if it was always off, as I never compared it to other meter when I first got it. I was just ecstatic (at the time) about doing in- circuit testing and assumed everything else was accurate as well.
I otherwise like the unit but left unresolved I'm probably going to have to get a Peak esr meter instead which also supports in circuit testing. Up to realizing this had an issue, I was a huge proponent on forums and to friends to get the esr micro, but now...
 
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