Experimental Measurement System

[pfredX1]

I tried to improve the performance of those HF calipers by taking them apart, deburring them, and cleaning the grinding sludge out of them. The results of that were mixed.

[rgsparber]

I tried to improve the performance of those HF calipers by taking them apart, deburring them, and cleaning the grinding sludge out of them. The results of that were mixed.

I have found a wide variation in HF calipers probably due to a variety of suppliers. I try them out in the store and if rough, just move on to the next box. The best ones are great. The rest are not worth buying. Once I have a mechanically sound caliper, this does not mean it is accurate. But as long as the error doesn't change, my system can cancel it.

Rick

[Paul Alciatore]

Rick,

That looks like a wonderful idea. I am planning to install some scales and perhaps one caliper on my mill for a shop made DRO and I will want to bring the readings from those scales and caliper to a central display so I am very interested in the code used to pick up the caliper's readings. I will be watching this thread so please do publish more on this.

[Paul Alciatore]

I have several of the Chinese import calipers and have found that the biggest problem with them is the fit between the beam/scale and the sliding head. There are a couple of small screws that are intended to allow you to adjust the fit and clearance, but that adjustment is difficult. I suspect that the beam/scale is not ground to a uniform width along all of it's length so you must have some slop in places so that other places will allow movement. Probably the biggest improvement you could make to them would be to carefully spot the beam/scale and then bring down the high spots. Of course, you would need to keep it straight during this procedure. This is probably the first, big difference between the imports and the quality brands.

I tried to improve the performance of those HF calipers by taking them apart, deburring them, and cleaning the grinding sludge out of them. The results of that were mixed.

[Carnel]

Hi Rick, an eye opener for me. Never had the idea of connecting my caliper to my scope. Tanks!
Do you know these sites:
Chinese Scales
https://www.instructables.com/id/Rea...n-Arduino-USB/

Cheers,
Harry

[rgsparber]

Hi Rick, an eye opener for me. Never had the idea of connecting my caliper to my scope. Tanks!
Do you know these sites:
Chinese Scales
https://www.instructables.com/id/Rea...n-Arduino-USB/

Cheers,
Harry

I am familiar with the Shumatech site. The instructable article was new to me. I was not comfortable with how they interfaced the Arduino with the caliper. They do say it is a bit of a hack. IMHO, the hard part is figuring out which data format you have. After that, the driver software is not too bad.

Rick