Review on Enhance Your Electrical Troubleshooting 🔧 with the General Tools CS5 Kit by Kyle Mason

I tested each of the units included in the General Tools CS5 Electrical Troubleshooting Kit and was impressed. I will give my opinion separately for each of the 3 devices featured in this set. -- Digital multimeter. As a professional user of electronic test equipment, I always had to select the type of measurement on the multimeter first throughout my life. So it was a bit cumbersome to measure the resistance and then immediately measure the AC voltage without changing the instrument. I have to say I flinched a bit, but the General Multimeter did the job. Shorting the ends of the test lead together gives the expected 0 ohms and a few seconds later the wires were plugged into a 115VAC outlet and the expected voltage measured. In fact, AC voltage is measured identically with another calibrated multimeter I have. I extended the DC voltage test by measuring the DC power of the laptop used to write this review. Here, too, the right range was selected and exactly the right value was measured, in this case 20.3 VDC. One criticism I'd like to have is that the meter doesn't have a way to mount it or attach it to anything, especially because it's so small and the test leads are only about 18 inches long. A short circuit is often the most convenient for me. It's a smooth plastic body. It's slippery. It would be an improvement to add texture to the body for better support. - Voltage Detector: An easy-to-use device and incredibly useful given the danger that a hot AC wire can pose. I was struck by his choice of sensitivity. I tested the device by connecting the power cord to a table lamp. At the highest sensitivity setting, the device reported a detection approximately 3 feet from the power cord. At a lower setting, the device's tip almost touched the cable before reporting a detection. The attached video demonstrates this test. I think the minimum detection setting is most useful when trying to determine the capabilities of a power cord in a small area like an outlet. The sensitivity slider also turns on the power and doubles. It will flash every 2 seconds to let you know it's on, so you can turn it off and save batteries. When switched on or off, the test button turns on a small LED light bulb for illumination. Not much light, but better than nothing, especially when fiddling with the power supply. -- AC Network Analyzer: The AC Network Analyzer is extremely easy to use. Plug into a 3-pin wall socket and 3 lights will illuminate to identify one of the 6 configurations. The device is printed with a clear legend that defines the meaning of the lamps. It detects a good connection to open ground, hot and neutral, and opposite hot/neutral OUTPUT: All 3 devices serve different purposes, making the kit convenient and easy to use, especially with an auto selectable multimeter. The little nits I have on the multimeter don't detract from its 5 star rating.