On 2013-08-22, wrote:

Why does it stay on all the time and blink? Shouldn't it be should
when your making measurements? And turn of when not in use?

I've seen some which blink when the battery (actually, cell) is
low and in need of replacement.

And your question of the correct battery (cell) for the Fowler
is only in the "Subject: " header line line, and easy to miss when
reading the body of the article. I don't know about the Fowler ones
(especially since they have had several designs over the years), but
most these days will work fine with the SR-357 or the SR-44 (Silver
Oxide cells -- not the other cells with the '44' or '357' numbers which
are the same size, but are Alkaline cells and don't last nearly as long.

The calipers never turn fully off, BTW. The "OFF" button, if
present, only turns off the display, leaving the scale reading circuits
active, so you can turn it back on and not have to zero it (well ...
depends on which model whether they do that or not -- some zero when you
hit the "ON" button. And -- this applies to almost all models. The
only exception that I know of was the one sold by Brown & Sharpe way
back when, which used a pair of LEDs driving an optical encoder, and
those killed the cells (four PX-13 -- mercury cells, now made of
unobtanium). :-)

I've got an old Starrett one which likes to eat cells (two
CR2032 cells IIRC), but you can slide the holder about an eight of an
inch to disconnect the cells when you are not using it, and this gives a
lot longer life -- at the cost of having to re-zero every time you pick
them up and turn them on. :-)

Good Luck,
DoN.

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