Company gains productivity and saves time with new test instrument

Test & Measurement

24 January 2001 Test & Measurement

Since its purchase of two Fluke 199 scopemeters from Spescom MeasureGraph early in 2000, Century Avionics has reported substantial savings in time and productivity, as well as the added convenience of using only one piece of testing equipment for a multitude of tasks.

"While previously we needed to use bench oscilloscopes, multimeters and frequency counters in our workshop and installations department, our technicians and engineers are delighted with the new convenience of using only one piece of test equipment," says Marc Robinson, Avionics' engineer at the company.

Century Avionics specialises in the installation, testing and bench repair of aircraft avionic systems. The range of equipment used in the company workshops includes audio switching and amplification, VHF communication (both AM and FM), navigation, distance measuring, transponder, global positioning systems and weather radar systems.

The Fluke 199 scopemeter has already proved its use in the testing and calibration of all aspects of electronic circuitry of aircraft avionic systems, including communication, navigation, distance measuring, transponder, radar and global positioning.

"Our product is sophisticated, specialised and intricate and deserves test equipment to match," says Robinson. "And we are most impressed with the ability of our new Fluke testers which are used primarily for voltage measurement, diode and transistor testing, continuity testing and, most importantly, the viewing of waveforms and pulses over a relatively large range of frequencies."

The Fluke ScopeMeter 190 Series has been designed to meet the needs of service professionals and electronic engineers involved in system integration of engineering, installation and second-line services and who need high performance oscilloscopes which are easy to carry, have fast troubleshooting capabilities and allow for detailed analysis.

"Our new acquisition offers us fantastic usability with its convenient size, weight and portability," says Robinson. "We have never before been able to effectively view a scope waveform on an item under test out in the field such as noise and interference on DC supply voltages which could lead to the undesirable operation or destruction of avionic equipment.

"As well as offering all the functions of a large bench oscilloscope, our new instruments have demonstrated PC compatibility with the print facility. We also enjoy features such as the 'hold' and 'record and replay' functions. And the time savings and increased productivity we have been able to achieve means that we are able to return units to our customers in a shorter time than was previously possible."

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Company gains productivity and saves time with new test instrument

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