measure inductance project
there is a simple way i used to do to give first order estimate of inductance value, but you must know a range where the inductance value falls in. simply connect a known cap shunt with the inductance, connect a suitable resitance value series with the LC tank, apply a signal generator to the resitance terminal and change frequency in the range you expect the LC tank to resonate, probe the AC voltage accross the tank with a simple AC meter, just when the meter peaks record the frequency value and susbtitute with the known Cap value in the well-known resonance equation to get the inductance.
This method has the following limitations:
1- A range for L should be known to tune the signal generator.
2- used cap should be much greater than the stray capacitance of the inductor as flatulent mentioned.
3-used resistance should be close in value to the parallel loss resistance of the tank.
4- and of course the AC meter should be able to detect the AC signal, which is advised to be small, few 100s KHz.
regards,