It occasionally comes to my attention that auditors entering Classes V and VI do not believe a meter can be made to read big.

They settle for ticks, tiny falls, etc., of the sort that can be found usually in getting mid ruds in. In all auditing up to Class V the usual meter needle read is around an eighth to a quarter of an inch long at sensitivity 16.

The Mark V is designed to give good serviceable reads for the lower classes of auditing and is quite wonderful at it.

But the moment you enter the wide vistas of Class V, the whole character of meter needle behaviour changes, you go from tiny read to big read.

In Classes V and VI tiny reads are used only for mid ruds as they were in lower levels. But in all work in goals, case analysis, plotting, finding items, checking things out, etc., reads are enormous.

A new horizon of metering dawns and an auditor coming up through the lower levels, entering Class V and VI work, just doesn’t believe it. Most of his early mistakes in checking out goals or finding the wrongnesses are entirely based on this. He thinks a tiny read is enough and he uses it. Whereas he really must never use a small read for this work.

If a goal is a real GPM, it will read with great, intermittent, inconsistent slashes. If an analysis of a situation is brought to the right answer, the meter needle falls hugely.

The trouble is that the auditor just doesn’t press on looking for the right answer and settles for ticks — because he can’t think up the right combination. The right combination “No GPM” or “Lock on an implant” will send the needle racing.

All mistakes on goals or situations in Classes V and VI can be traced to a failure to appreciate that metering is different at these levels.

The sensitivity at Class VI has to be kept around 4. You only use sensitivity 8 or 16 to get in since mid ruds. On all R6 work you shut the meter down. You can’t keep the needle at set if you use a sensitivity higher than 4.

Here’s a Class V or VI student fiasco, based on using Class III expected meter behavior on high-level work:

Auditor finds goal on list that ticks (1/8"). Asks if it’s the correctly worded goal. Gets a tick (1/16"). Runs it on the pc. Pc collapses.

Here’s the real way it should have been: Auditor finds goal on list that only ticks. Gets in Suppress and Invalidate on the list. Re-nulls. Finds another goal. Gets in Suppress on it. Gets a third of a dial instant slash (all goals and items must instant read). Checks it out until he gets a 3" prior slash on actual GPM. Gets a 2" slightly latent or prior slash on “correctly worded.” Gives it to the pc and pc thrives.

It’s not asking the right question (what it really is) that gives you ticks.

In fact a tick with a sharp edge at Class V or VI really means “wrong question asked!”

Big reads are the only reads you buy at Class V and VI. Learn the right questions to ask about the character or nature of what you’re examining and you get the big falls, RRs, etc.

So it’s a lack of knowledge of track analysis that makes the auditor fall back on small reads.

And he’ll fail.

The second stage of desperation enters at Class V and VI when the student, hammered by the Instructors, still can’t get big reads (through lack of knowledge of the track and what things can be).

The student then abandons all he knew about body motion causing needle reaction. The quickly exhaled breath, the shuffled feet, the can fling about, the stretch, the can bang, all cause big surges. So the auditor encourages the pc to shout goals and items or fling himself about so the meter will react big.

This, of course, will spin the pc, getting no charge off, running wrong goals and RIs.

By the time the student auditor is trained not to take body motion, shout or breath reads, his track analysis has also improved and he starts to ask the right questions and gets his big reads with the pc quiet as a lamb.

I never touch a TA during the pc’s body movement. This loses TA, of course, since a pc is most likely to move when an RI starts to discharge. I never buy a goal unless I’ve seen it instant read, bang on the last letter. I never ask the character of anything to instant read, i.e. “Is this an implant GPM,” because it may go on anticipate or arrive latent.

And do I get TA on the pc! In goals finding and plotting you don’t expect much TA. Yet in six consecutive sessions I built TA a few divisions more per session, from 70 TA down divisions to 103 TA down divisions in 2½-hour sessions, and all by never buying a tick, only big RRs or falls. Gradual build of TA shows all is well.

So Classes V and VI are not only big read classes, but they are big TA classes as well.

As you are handling the basic sources of charge on a case in Classes V and VI, you expect big meter behaviour and you get it.

Only ignorance of the track keeps the auditor in the small read, small TA departments.

If you keep on trying to get what it really is until you have it, you will always see a big read on what it is.

You wouldn’t expect to handle high voltage wires with tiny sparks. You would expect huge arcs to crackle. Similarly with the materials of Classes V and VI.

If you don’t believe a meter will read big at Classes V and VI, then you haven’t learned yet to find the right things and ask the right questions.

And if you settle for ticks or have to make the pc yell items to get big reads you’ll soon have a very messed up case on your hands.

So it’s a different meter behaviour at the higher classes. Expect it, look for it and make it R E A D!