Are you connecting the meter in series? If not, .017 may just be open lead drift. If the meter has different settings (some auto-scale), then it could be .017 amps, which is also 17 milliamps. Make sure you are on at least the 20 amp setting, & the leads are black to common, & red on the amp input. You'll have to break the circuit, put the red lead on the source (battery side), & the black lead on the generator. Unless it's digital (which it sounds like it is) in which case the direction of the leads don't matter, it'll just read negative amps if it's backwards. With no current it should read 0, but may bounce a little. .017 could be the bounce, but when it is in the circuit, it should read a whole number. If it goes to a 1 on the far left, the current is over range, & you should go to the next higher range, provided there is a higher range. Mine only goes to 20 Amps max. If you search this forum, member dennis13030 has excellent posts on how to use a shunt to read higher amps. (search shunt)
1998 Ford Ranger 3.0 liter V6
Modified Smack design installed 6/20/08
Modest gains of about 1.5 MPG (17.8 to 19.3)
No sensor controls (yet)