What's my resistor?

See

Briefly: for the digits, brown corresponds to a "1", black to a "0". There are three digits indicating the value, one digit which indicates the multiplier (a power-of-ten), and the final digit indicates the precision.

What you have, it appears, is a 10001 coding, which means (100 * 10^0), (1%) resistor. In other words, the color coding says that it's a 100-ohm 1%-precision resistor, which matches up nicely to what your meter is saying.

A 100K 1% resistor would be (100 * 10^3), (1%), which would be color-coded brown-black-black-orange-brown.

A less-precise resistor such as a 5% would have only four bands, with two digits for the value. A 100-ohm resistor of this sort would be coded brown-black-brown-gold (10 * 10^1) (5%), and a 100k-ohm resistor would be brown-black-yellow-gold (10 * 10^4) (5%).

In the European system of writing resistor values, it's usual to write an "R" or "K" or "M" in the location of a decimal point or comma... for instance, "2R2" would be 2.2 ohms, "2K2" would be 2,200 ohms, "10M" would be 10,000,000 ohms, and so forth.

In this scheme of writing, what you *wanted* was a 100K, and what you got was a 100R.

Sounds like a 100.0 ohm 1% resistor. It's conceivable that the experts at Maplin may have inadvertently given you the incorrect part.

(it will be brown black yellow gold)

For 100K 1% it would be brown black black orange brown

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

I already replied once, but it didnt seen to appear, so apologies if its here more than once.

Thanks to both of you that replied.

You have confirmed my suspicions that I do have the wrong resistor (thanks! Maplin staff!). As a newbie to this sort of thing, you have been a great help - I thank you again.

Kind regards

Bill.

(P.S. I wonder if Maplin offer any sort of compensation for blowing up your hardware for supplying the wrong components? - I doubt it!)

Thanks to all who have responded,

You have confirmed that I have the wrong resistor (I thought this was the case, but a confirmation is good). Typical Maplin staff!

I will return there tomorrow and buy another, and this time I will get them to meter it for me and show me what it really is.

Your help is much appreciated. As a newbie to this area I need help from people like you.

Many thanks,

Bill.

Dave Platt wrote:

Maplin experts? "ex" is a has-been, and "spert" is a drip under pressure!

Just don't let these unskilled twerps hold both ends of the 100k resistor whilst testing it, otherwise it will probably indicate a lot lower value.