A late thought. Say you buy a HF, or generic tool of sorts to save maybe $20 or so. You're feeling great in saving a bit of green, but "what if" that tool causes a miss-diagnosis......Or chasing good parts because.....
Most gauges, even on name brand items in the automotive world have a + or - 5-10% accuracy range. Let alone most don't have a way to compensate for elevation changes, hence why the "0" is usually so large. It's considered perfectly acceptable. You're more so after consistency. Does it hold vacuum? Doesn't really matter if it's 5-8"hg. Does it hold pressure? Again, doesn't matter if it 7-10 psi for the work being done. We're not in a lab environment working on small engines and non of the parameters are so critical that the cheaper Guage sets can't be used for accurate diagnosis. Truthfully, if I didn't already have a lot of high end tools from being a professional mechanic I wouldn't be wasting the money on name brand stuff that would spend 90% of it's life collecting dust.A late thought. Say you buy a HF, or generic tool of sorts to save maybe $20 or so. You're feeling great in saving a bit of green, but "what if" that tool causes a miss-diagnosis......Or chasing good parts because.....
You’re not wrong. The QA/QC on those tools is hit-or-miss and that’s why they’re so inexpensive. So yeah some percentage of those tools straight up fail the first time they’re used. Just a fact.A late thought. Say you buy a HF, or generic tool of sorts to save maybe $20 or so. You're feeling great in saving a bit of green, but "what if" that tool causes a miss-diagnosis......Or chasing good parts because.....
You are the pro tech case in point… on a desert island you’d be annoyed but if you had a pile of chainsaws and nothing but coconuts and a HF store you could make them all run no problem. But you know what you’re doing…Most gauges, even on name brand items in the automotive world have a + or - 5-10% accuracy range. Let alone most don't have a way to compensate for elevation changes, hence why the "0" is usually so large. It's considered perfectly acceptable. You're more so after consistency. Does it hold vacuum? Doesn't really matter if it's 5-8"hg. Does it hold pressure? Again, doesn't matter if it 7-10 psi for the work being done. We're not in a lab environment working on small engines and non of the parameters are so critical that the cheaper Guage sets can't be used for accurate diagnosis. Truthfully, if I didn't already have a lot of high end tools from being a professional mechanic I wouldn't be wasting the money on name brand stuff that would spend 90% of it's life collecting dust.
I ran as a road tech for many years. One of our saying was "if we don't have it, we didn't need it." There are plenty of ways to skin a cat, even on much more complicated engine (systems) then to get worked up about accuracy of a cheap gauge used on a small 2 stroke engine imo. If it's off a few psi, or 2"hg doesn't really matter. Another case in point, I have a very nice opama spark tester. Beautiful high tension leads, scaled needle adjustment which corresponds to spark kv rating. Think it was around $60.00 a $10.00 harbor freight spark tester will get you to the same point.You are the pro tech case in point… on a desert island you’d be annoyed but if you had a pile of chainsaws and nothing but coconuts and a HF store you could make them all run no problem. But you know what you’re doing…
A late thought. Say you buy a HF, or generic tool of sorts to save maybe $20 or so. You're feeling great in saving a bit of green, but "what if" that tool causes a miss-diagnosis......Or chasing good parts because.....
No argument there. I have a German durometer (tool for seeing how soft or hard motorcycle roadracing slicks are) that the Pirelli guys left in my cart years ago… I’m told it’s super expensive… and yeah I’ve used it a few times myself… but the fact is I know when tires are “done” and I don’t need their fancy machine to tell meI ran as a road tech for many years. One of our saying was "if we don't have it, we didn't need it." There are plenty of ways to skin a cat, even on much more complicated engine (systems) then to get worked up about accuracy of a cheap gauge used on a small 2 stroke engine imo. If it's off a few psi, or 2"hg doesn't really matter. Another case in point, I have a very nice opama spark tester. Beautiful high tension leads, scaled needle adjustment which corresponds to spark kv rating. Think it was around $60.00 a $10.00 harbor freight spark tester will get you to the same point.
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