Yeah so I've been wondering about this for years.
I like the HF digital calipers - they are cheap and very accurate.
For the most part they are smooth running and comparable in accuracy to the $150 Mitutoyos at work.
The bad thing is that battery life - they seem to go through batteries fairly quickly. I have 2 or 3 pairs in the shop for use and another inside the house.
I did have one that was for the most part intermittent - got worse and should have returned it. Another I had bought on sale and had not used had a real rough running slide.
So I spent a couple of hours messing around - the intermittent one had a battery lead that just pulled off when I tugged on it - unsoldered. I resoldered it but it was still quite intermittent.
I finally took the electronics off and tossed it and used the electronics from the rough running one and mated them to get a perfect set.
So I saved $10 with a hour or two work! At least I learned some things.
One thing I did learn was about the limited battery life.
It didn't seem to last that long but I have been using the carded LR44 batteries off eBay, ten for $1.99 or $1.29 or so with free shipping. Bad batteries? excessive drain?
So I put my good electronics meters on it.
Seems it draws 22 uA whether it is on or not. In other words, turning it off saves virtually no power. I tried two different ones, same result.
So An LR44 is rated 150 mAh. That means a good battery should last about 6800 hours at 22 uA.(9 months).
So
But anyway that's why I get short life (less than a year) from the batteries.
I like the HF digital calipers - they are cheap and very accurate.
For the most part they are smooth running and comparable in accuracy to the $150 Mitutoyos at work.
The bad thing is that battery life - they seem to go through batteries fairly quickly. I have 2 or 3 pairs in the shop for use and another inside the house.
I did have one that was for the most part intermittent - got worse and should have returned it. Another I had bought on sale and had not used had a real rough running slide.
So I spent a couple of hours messing around - the intermittent one had a battery lead that just pulled off when I tugged on it - unsoldered. I resoldered it but it was still quite intermittent.
I finally took the electronics off and tossed it and used the electronics from the rough running one and mated them to get a perfect set.
So I saved $10 with a hour or two work! At least I learned some things.
One thing I did learn was about the limited battery life.
It didn't seem to last that long but I have been using the carded LR44 batteries off eBay, ten for $1.99 or $1.29 or so with free shipping. Bad batteries? excessive drain?
So I put my good electronics meters on it.
Seems it draws 22 uA whether it is on or not. In other words, turning it off saves virtually no power. I tried two different ones, same result.
So An LR44 is rated 150 mAh. That means a good battery should last about 6800 hours at 22 uA.(9 months).
So
- the cheap 20 cent batteries I get are not so bad.
- you are not saving anything by turning it off
- they will theoretically last less than a year continuously ( 9 months) if you don't take it out of the socket.They will last a whole lot longer if you want to go to the trouble of taking it out of the unit.
- I get about 6 months it seems - maybe that's the 20 cent battery penalty; not as good as a name brand battery that costs $3.50 at the retail stores..
But anyway that's why I get short life (less than a year) from the batteries.
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