Greg Mayman wrote in a message to Jasen Betts:

 -=> Jasen Betts said to Greg Mayman
 -=> about "*BIG* TRANSISTORS" on 01-10-04  07:52.....

 JB> yeah:) not having three hands I added some other hardware for ease of
 JB> use. 
 GM>  
 GM> Did you ever try the trick of using skin conduction to bias the
 GM> transistor?

 GM> Place the ohmmeter across collector to emitor, but hold the metal
 GM> part of the probe on the collector lead between your thumb and
 GM> forefinger. Then place the second finger on the base lead. You
 GM> should see an increase in the meter reading (lowering of the
 GM> resistance value shown by the meter).

 GM> This can be done onehanded if you can use the same hand to
 GM> support the emitter connection to the meter ;-)

I was just reading something not too long ago that talked about a very
similar technique for testing FETs...

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