Digital multimeter with capacitor tester

[Findm-Keepm]

Originally Posted by N2IXK

Capacitance test ranges are common on cheap multimeters nowadays. You shouldn't have a problem finding one in the sub-$100 price range.

The problem is that DMM capacitance testers (even on better grade multimeters) are fairly worthless for testing the capacitors found in vintage gear. They only apply a few volts to the cap, which may not identify leakage in capacitors that normally see hundreds or thousands of volts. Typical DMMs wont find high ESR, either, a common failure mode in electrolytic caps.

If you are working on vintage gear, you would be better served with a vintage capacitor tester, like a Sprague Tel-O-Mike or similar.

Agreed - get yourself a vintage tester, or one of the newer ESR testers. Either way, much better than a value only tester.

Cheers,