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Appreciation post: How a $40 signal tester saved me a whole day of trouble
I always thought those cheap little signal testers were a waste of money. I mean, I just used my multimeter for everything like most folks. But last week I was working on a tricky install in an old house over in Oakwood. The panel kept showing a trouble condition on zone 3 and I spent a good 3 hours crawling through the attic checking wire connections. Nothing looked wrong on my meter. Finally I grabbed a buddy's signal tester that he left in my truck. Hooked it up to the zone wires and it immediately showed a weak intermittent signal. Turns out there was a tiny break inside the wire jacket where a mouse had chewed it. I never would have found that with just a multimeter. So yeah, I ordered one for myself that same night. Has anyone else had a cheap tool like that save them from a headache?
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danieltaylor25d ago
Borrowed one once, saved me chasing a ghost fault for hours.
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charlie_roberts8725d ago
Gonna have to disagree a bit here. A signal tester is just another box you gotta carry around and hope has batteries. A multimeter with a good min/max function catches the same intermittent stuff if you know how to set it up right. I spent way too long learning to read voltage drops and resistance changes on my meter and it's never let me down. Throwing more gadgets at a problem feels like a crutch when the old school methods work just fine if you put in the practice.
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