The Multimeter Story

I will be overly explanatory here, because while I know perfectly well that a sizable portion of the audience understands circuits, I also have personal experience to confirm that a good portion generally doesn't care about any of it.

So, to sum up a bit, I'm currently in Electrician's Apprentice School. On base, it's called the Combat Systems school, but because of how involved it is for ETs (unlike Gunner's Mates, who get in and out of there in two weeks, and then get to go to San Diego - lucky ducks), we could all certify to be Apprentices in the civilian world afterwards. If we had time.

(Quick note - my sisters have commented on the abbreviations of different rates. "T" is almost always a technician. "N" stands for some kind of "-man." Seaman, Fireman, Mineman, Engineman, etc. The reason "man" is not "M" is because of "mates". Not all rates have existed at all times in the Navy - and the three oldest are Boatswain's Mates, Gunner's Mates, and Yeoman (pretty much a Naval secretary). )

So, I spend time troubleshooting circuits and trying to figure out what's wrong with them, and the problems and circuits get more interesting as I advance through the lessons. Generally, you figure out circuit problems by calculating what the proper values of current, voltage, and resistance should be here, there, and right next to there, and if the measured values don't match the calculations, you try to figure out why.

You can measure current with an ammeter, or resistance with an Ohmmeter, or you can be supercool and use a multimeter, which can be adjusted to measure current, resistance, voltage, and play with diodes. I can explain why you have to measure current in a different way than voltage, but frankly, you don't care.

Now then. Fuses and circuit breakers. Let's focus on fuses. A fuse is a tiny little wire in a little glass jar. When it gets too hot, it melts, and opens the circuit. Current can't run through it anymore. Fuses are in place to keep you from frying your equipment.

I know five different ways to fry a fuse in a multimeter. I didn't do any of them. I was closely following directions. My instructor was even watching for one of these. (I say instructor, but he's more of a proctor - our instructors are the computers). They can't figure out what I did. I can't figure out what I did.

There's a saying from one nasty group in a sci-fi series I used to read. "Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is the work of the enemy." It's definitely possible for any student to fry a fuse in a multimeter. It's conceivable that you could fry a fuse in a multimeter twice in a day.

At the third time, I said, "Okay, at this point, we have to assume user error. What am I doing wrong here?" This moment clearly indicated the distinction between Boot Camp and ATT - in Boot Camp, you can have no responsibility over whatever just broke, and you will still get blamed for it. In ATT, I'm saying this to an FC1 (rank that usually takes at least six years to make), acknowledging, "Yes, I'm pretty sure this is my fault. How do I fix it?" and he's very hesitant to blame me. Because he doesn't want to make me feel bad.

I'm looking at him, point-blank, thinking, "Seriously? I came out of Boot Camp less than a month ago. I don't care if you hurt my feelings, I just want to get my work done. Now, tell me how to fix this so I can move on and not be stuck here for the rest of the day!" This would be referred to as "eyeballing" in Basic. You don't make eye contact with anybody above you in Boot Camp, unless you are directly in conversation with them.

But, three times? Three times frying a fuse (the same fuse, no less) in one day? That's just ridiculous. And, each time I do it, I have to swap out multimeters with somebody else in the room, so that the proctor can take this one down to the shop to get the fuse replaced. Fortunately, not everyone's in the same place in their lessons - H is on oscilloscopes instead, and Hayer is actually kind of hoping that I break his because he's hit a mind-block and doesn't want to do anything for the rest of the day. So, I fried mine, they took that down. Fried H's, took that down. Mine was back by then, fried it again. Sigh.

So, four times is not only ridiculous, it's beyond ridiculous. And I still don't know what I did! I know ways that it's possible to do what I did, but I didn't do any of those! Also, to add to the fun - I had never blown a fuse in a multimeter before today. And I went through four of them today.

Sigh. It's been a very trying day. I want chocolate and a bubble bath. Clearly, I'll have to toughen up, as this will not fly when I'm in the Fleet.