You could easily do it with a PIC and LCD display, even a BASIC STAMP would do - it has a pulse measuring command.
For a simple analogue meter, just average the pulses using a lowpass filter and feed a meter - it's basically a PWM signal, which is commonly used to provide a variable DC voltage from a micro-controller (a great many TV's use this method for the tuning voltage). The only difficulty is getting the low-pass filter right.
Nigel, I have heard about using a lowpass filter to convert digital PWM signals to analogue signals. What are the parameters to determine the cutoff-frequency of the lowpass filter though?
Nigel, I have heard about using a lowpass filter to convert digital PWM signals to analogue signals. What are the parameters to determine the cutoff-frequency of the lowpass filter though?
If you look on the MicroChip website at https://www.microchip.com they have an application note about using PWM to generate analogue voltages, they give the details there.