Need advice on current measurement

Hi Edgar,

For 100 Amps AC you'll need a current transformer with a ratio of 100:5. Then use a good quality ammeter rated for 5 amps. With quality instruments you can get better than 1% accuracy. If you need isolation and/or a permanent setup use a current transducer and a digital pannel meter with the current transformer. One word of warning - never disconnect the ammeter (or other load) from the current transformer when power is applied. Otherwise, the current transformer will act like a large ratio step-up transformer for the voltage and POW!

If money is tight just rent some portable equipment from a instrument rental place for a day or two. As to vendors try Transdata, Inc. for current transducers and such. For portable stuff (possibly to rent) try Dranetz.

Hope this helps, Big John

You can use a 1% 0.01 ohm power resistor and read the voltage with a 3% multimeter. That is easy. They are gold colored, metal cased, flat on one side to heat sink. 100 watt.

(if you like this idea, please let me stay at UH on my vacation!)

BG Micro

has some 0.005 Ohm 10W resistors for under $1 each. (p/n RES1385) A handful of these and a simple DMM should do the trick.

Norm

in article chb18f$bks$ snipped-for-privacy@news.hawaii.edu, Edgar Y. Lobachevskiy at snipped-for-privacy@hawaii.edu wrote on 9/2/04 6:10 PM:

You do not say how precise or accurate a measurement you require. Do you need to trace back to NIST? For Government work, equipment must be clibrated. There certainly are laboratories around the country and even in Hawaii that make a business of calibration and even measurement. But until you specify what you need, nothing will make sense.

Bikll

how do you know this?

I have

one method: meter shunts

here is a new

200A for $4 meant to be used with a 50 mV @ full scale meter movement.

the low voltage drop minimizes heating and consequently minimizes drift in accuracy due to temp coefficient.

makes it a challange dont it?... and sometimes we guess wrong

Hi, all:

I would like to thank you all for your help regarding my question. I would like to thank Big John for suggesting to use the current transformer. I located such item and it will do the job to the precision of about -+1%. This is sufficient for now. Also I would like to thank Norm and Tim for giving me leads on where to get some parts for my measurements. I think I will get some shunt resistors for future use, since the current transformer is not mine and I will have to return it.

make a 10:1 current transformer? you didn't mention the frequency. is it constant? sam

There's an eBay item right now

is a 1000Amp 50 mV current shunt and "matching" analog panel meter. It's currently going for $5.50 with 4 bids on it and 1 day to go as of 11AM EDT this morning. With a good DMM with a 200 mV scale it sounds exactly like what you need.

Norm