Handheld Oscilloscopes

[sg66]

A DSO is the digital version of the analogue oscilloscopes. You wont want the analogue type as tgey are huge and don't offer anywhere near as many features as the digital type.
A proper DSO will be very flexible, you can read voltages, currents aswell as see signals. Some even come with serial decoders so you can read the CAN bus etc.

Picoscopes are pretty good, we use them at work. They are cheaper and smaller than a high performance scope, so everybody can have one on their desk.
They are far better than the generic chinese scopes but lightyears away from the 2 grand scopes used in the lab.
Oh, you will need a laptop with a picoscope. A DSO is stand alone, no laptop required.

Good friend of mine with some seriously expensive scopes, decoded the security protocols from a Nissan.

Can be very useful things in the right hands.

 

[Wightsparks]

Hmm.... I'm thinking that would be useful for road-test data - I have a Picoscope and a datalogger which are great for workshop use but a pain for capturing engine, drivetrain or suspension data under load. A couple of questions if I may @Wightsparks , is the data exportable and what are the niggles? Thanks.

Wightsparks, so that was one I was looking at. Does it/would it show up a miss albeit small on the ignition system on a petrol engine then? And what is the difference in the 2 channels and is the bandwith figure a limiting factor on what the machine can do? Electronics is black magic to me by the way!

@Ubique You can save waveforms for viewing on the scope and you can save a screen capture - on mine the capture is buggy with the side of the screen in the middle, probably sorted by now. You can plug in and it's just a USB drive. Battery is a good 4hrs. Used it today to look at the convertible top position sensor's output on a Saab 9-3, pull downs are 10ms apart. As you can see it was saying it was both closed and open at the same time.



The Vmax etc readouts only work below 200ms, there is no scale just a value per division, trigger is a bit tricky and couple of things say + when they should say - .
But for me it's very good value 20v max readout but 400v protection.

Yes @p0689109 if you set it up to capture say 4 plugs firing or 4 injectors it will be obvious if there is a drop out of one. There is nothing complicated about a scope it is just measuring voltage over time. So if you set it up to 1s /division (along) and 2.5v/division (up) if you connect to one side of a 9v battery and tap the other side side on the other terminal you will see the line go slowly across the screen and jump up to 9v and back down - a square wave !
Again, Darren explains it simply

 

[Wightsparks]

For me a scope is like the top end of electrical diag. A good scan tool to start, then test light/logic probe, multimeters, amp clamps etc, the scope is (generally) for really complicated stuff.

Can be but the roof sensor fault above you would not see it any other way, too fast for the scan tool to see - but slow enough for the control module to have a hissy fit. Voltage is the same on good and bad. - But of course I started with a scan tool to ID the culprits, then a test light on the powers and grounds at the module. Then the small scope and fortunately did not need the Pico.

 

[Ubique]

@Ubique You can save waveforms for viewing on the scope and you can save a screen capture - on mine the capture is buggy with the side of the screen in the middle, probably sorted by now. You can plug in and it's just a USB drive. Battery is a good 4hrs. Used it today to look at the convertible top position sensor's output on a Saab 9-3, pull downs are 10ms apart. As you can see it was saying it was both closed and open at the same time.

View attachment 328693

The Vmax etc readouts only work below 200ms, there is no scale just a value per division, trigger is a bit tricky and couple of things say + when they should say - .
But for me it's very good value 20v max readout but 400v protection.

Yes @p0689109 if you set it up to capture say 4 plugs firing or 4 injectors it will be obvious if there is a drop out of one. There is nothing complicated about a scope it is just measuring voltage over time. So if you set it up to 1s /division (along) and 2.5v/division (up) if you connect to one side of a 9v battery and tap the other side side on the other terminal you will see the line go slowly across the screen and jump up to 9v and back down - a square wave !
Again, Darren explains it simply

Thanks for that, looks like a handy 'quick check' tool, we get a lot of alarm faults due to a 'dirty' LIN, not enough to cause LoS though. The only way to confirm it properly is to 'scope the LIN, setting up the Picoscope takes long enough to be a pain to do it every few days, this looks like a 'good enough' solution where an indication, not an exact measurement is needed.

 

[mtt.tr]

Thanks for that, looks like a handy 'quick check' tool, we get a lot of alarm faults due to a 'dirty' LIN, not enough to cause LoS though. The only way to confirm it properly is to 'scope the LIN, setting up the Picoscope takes long enough to be a pain to do it every few days, this looks like a 'good enough' solution where an indication, not an exact measurement is needed.

I'm very inclined to order a usb scope and try it with my tablet.

 

[Ubique]

I'm very inclined to order a usb scope and try it with my tablet.

If I was starting from scratch, that's probably the route i'd take, all my Fluke Connect stuff connects to my laptop, my Picoscope connects to my laptop, as does various other bits & pieces, but it's all geared up for measurement, what I'd like is a (reliable) indication, quick to deploy and relatively autonomous. I already have all the input leads, adaptors (well, most of 'em) and sensors I'm likely to need, it's as bit like having a choice between a decade box with 10% accuracy or a box of terminated resistors with 1% accuracy, quick checks will be fine with the decade box, for measurement, you need the individual resistors, connected to give you the precise impedance you're after.

 

[willie.macleod]

Does anyone have a Pokit meter? They seem to have be popping up in my feeds online for some time now but I'd like to know if they end up being as handy as they look, the biggest downside being the limited range of voltages it can measure. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07PR93HV8/

 

[p0689109]

Moose Mcalpine I have multi meters including a few old fashioned AVO meters as well as a couple of code reader hand helds for types of car as well as general work. So I can and do understand the electrical side of it but have never had anything to do with electronics. The defect I had could not be pinned down with the equipment I have and was advised by a forum that the scope could maybe show it hence my questions.

 

[mtt.tr]

If I was starting from scratch, that's probably the route i'd take, all my Fluke Connect stuff connects to my laptop, my Picoscope connects to my laptop, as does various other bits & pieces, but it's all geared up for measurement, what I'd like is a (reliable) indication, quick to deploy and relatively autonomous. I already have all the input leads, adaptors (well, most of 'em) and sensors I'm likely to need, it's as bit like having a choice between a decade box with 10% accuracy or a box of terminated resistors with 1% accuracy, quick checks will be fine with the decade box, for measurement, you need the individual resistors, connected to give you the precise impedance you're after.

Sure beat dragging my bench scope outside