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Old way of tracing wire bundles vs. new continuity testers - anyone made the switch?
Back when I started in 2018, I'd spend HOURS manually poking through bundles with a multimeter to find that one broken pin. Slow and drove me crazy. Now I use a $200 tone generator and probe combo that finds breaks in under 5 minutes. But I know some old timers swear by the old method because it's more reliable. What did you guys switch to and was it worth the cost?
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sam_murphy3915d ago
Oh come on, dont tell me people actually think those cheap tone generators are reliable. I tried one last year and it gave me a false reading on a 10 year old bundle, had me chasing a ghost for two hours. The old way with a multimeter might be slower but at least you know what youre actually getting. Youre paying for convenience, not accuracy. And when youre dealing with critical stuff, spending an extra 10 minutes to be sure beats having to rip a panel off again next week.
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shane65515d ago
Man that cheap tester got me too. Picked one up for like 80 bucks and it swore up and down a bundle was clean when I actually had three crushed pins in the middle. Wasted half a shift pulling panels and rechecking everything before I grabbed my old Fluke and found the real problem. The tone generators are fine for basic stuff but they crap out on older wiring or anything with a little corrosion. I'd rather spend 15 minutes staring at a meter than chase ghosts with a beep box that lies to you.
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Aw man, I actually read a thread the other day where a guy who works on avionics swears he's never going back to tone generators after one nearly made him sign off on a bad bundle on a plane. Something about how the chinese chips in the cheap ones just can't handle dirty signals. @sam_murphy39 you're not wrong about the critical stuff thing, I'd rather take the slow road than redo a job because a $60 gadget lied to me. I keep a tone probe around for rough locating but for actual verification? Vintage multimeter every time.
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