Lathe DRO from Digital Caliper .. 10 Bucks .. 6" caliper has range of entire 16" bed

[Ed Weldon]

I've pretty much given up on HF and other cheap digital calipers and have returned to mechanical digital calipers. The cost of decent Chinese made mechanical dial calipers is lower than the cost of Chinese digital calipers and two years worth of batteries, not to mention the continuous maintenance schedule to insure they are ready for use. I did try buying batteries in bulk lots but soon found out that 30% were low voltage from the gitgo and most had reached that point after a year sitting in the special drawer in my tool box I set up for them (a place where temps always stay within 40F-100F air temperature.)
About Harbor Freight. I've bought a lot of stuff from them and have been very satisfied with the quality. But there are some classes of HF tools and supplies that I've found it's better to stay away from or at least buy 2 or 3 with the knowledge that it's likely one of those will be usable....... Ed Weldon, Los Gatos, CA, USA

[jjr2001]

Thanks Tm51, good info. I did a quick test and with my 2" indicator reading in parallel with the
digital caliper mod I had readings within .002" for a 2" range. Pretty good for what I do in the shop.
I compared 4 different digital calipers that I have in the shop to a part that I turned on the lathe
and they all were within .001" to .0015" of each other. I also tested them with a 1 2 3 block and again
every one was within .001" of the other so I am pretty happy with the results.

Thanks again for your insight.

Cheers, JR