Surface plate height gauge adapter for dial indicator holding

[tonyfoale]

Thanks Tony,
I've not machined many split clamps (the lathe tails stock quill, and drill press spindle both for depth measurement tooling are the only ones I can think of). So small thin slits I've not done, (and I don't think I have a thin saw in my tooling). Time for eBay search.

Steve,
You can make perfectly good slits using nothing more than a hacksaw. If you need wide slots you can load two blades in the same saw. i know that hand tools have passed out of fashion but they still have their uses, and often are the quickest way to achieve an objective.

How accurate is the linear encoder? I'm looking for something to use on the surface grinder, as I can't trust the down feed dial.

i envy you for having a surface grinder. i could really do with one as well as a cylindrical version, oh yes I might as well add a cam grinder whilst fantasising. The encoder pictured is/was 1 micron accuracy with 5 micron resolution using the usual X4 quadrature trick. However, it is with some embarrassment that I have to confess to recently zapping that encoder, accidentally applying 12v to it when 5v is desired and 5.5v is the limit. I found it NOS on ebay for $180, it was a bargain as shown when I asked for a repair quote from Heidenhain. Repair would have been £400 and renewal £1000. More googling and I found a new Ono Sokki GS-1830 Linear Gauge Sensor 30mm for $200 which should arrive this week. That has 1 micron resolution and 2 micron accuracy. So good quality examples are out there for good prices if you look and get lucky. There are dozens of cheap Chinese rotary encoders on the market which work pretty well but I have been unsuccessful with finding similar cheap versions of linear encoders, so new from regular suppliers means $1000 and up unless you get lucky on the internet.
Regarding the cam lobe measurer, I feed the rotary and linear encoder outputs into an Arduino for decoding and then pass it on to a Laptop via USB where it gets processed and plotted in analysis software that I wrote, which also combines it with flow bench data.

From looking at your piston crown thickness gauge, and your camshaft lobe metrology, you must do custom engine work needing such measurements. Is this for hobby or 'prostitution'?

I have just turned 73 so I'm a bit old for prostitution any more. Hobby is a bit mild, "life time passion" would be closer. i used to race motorcycles semi-seriously and now I race in classic events and I try to spend all my non-racing time sleeping or building/preparing my bikes.
In the 70s and 80s I had a business in the UK making bike chassis, many of which have won championships around the world. Since the late 80s i moved to live in Spain and since then I have not done any physical construction for others, finding it easier to tell others how to. In other words I became a madam. So I turned to writing, doing seminars and developing software etc. You can see more of my history and activities by looking at the following links in addition to a few posts that I have made on this forum, Homemade Tools built by tonyfoale - HomemadeTools.net . Although I seem to have gained the reputation as the chassis guru it has always been engines that have been a stronger interest.

TONY FOALE DESIGNS - Home page
Making stuff and having fun.
https://www.facebook.com/tony.foale.5
https://www.youtube.com/user/MotoChassis
https://get.google.com/albumarchive/...99061223276003

[metric_taper]

Steve,
You can make perfectly good slits using nothing more than a hacksaw. If you need wide slots you can load two blades in the same saw. i know that hand tools have passed out of fashion but they still have their uses, and often are the quickest way to achieve an objective.

I cheated and used the bandsaw to make the split cuts.

The one pictured is/was 1 micron accuracy with 5 micron resolution using the usual X4 quadrature trick. However, it is with some embarrassment that I have to confess to recently zapping that encoder, accidentally applying 12v to it when 5v is desired and 5.5v is the limit. I found it NOS on ebay for $180, it was a bargain as shown when I asked for a repair quote from Heidenhain. Repair would have been £400 and renewal £1000. More googling and I found a new Ono Sokki GS-1830 Linear Gauge Sensor 30mm for $200 which should arrive this week. That has 1 micron resolution and 2 micron accuracy. So good quality examples are out there for good prices if you look and get lucky. There are dozens of cheap Chinese rotary encoders on the market which work pretty well but I have been unsuccessful with finding similar cheap versions of linear encoders, so new from regular suppliers means $1000 and up unless you get lucky on the internet.

I've recently purchased a China digital indicator 0.001mm resolution @12.5mm travel ($36, £29) which remarkable is pretty darn good so far. At least I have not seen any non-monotonic behavior in it's count. It seems to mimic a 2 micron resolution "Peacock" test indicator. I have no idea what method of digitization is contained in this battery operated indicator. It also has a SPC output port, so it could be read by an external computer for recording. It did not come with a deviation card, nor a stated accuracy. I just looked at 50mm travel and Mitutoyo from China (and probably fake) is ~$270. So I can find a solution, within my means.
Darn, I found a similar indicator to the one just purchased, and it states a 10micron accuracy, so 10X it's display resolution. I guess you have to pay for accuracy.

I have just turned 73 so I'm a bit old for prostitution any more. Hobby is a bit mild, "life time passion" would be closer. i used to race motorcycles semi-seriously and now I race in classic events and I try to spend all my non-racing time sleeping or building/preparing my bikes.
In the 70s and 80s I had a business in the UK making bike chassis, many of which have won championships around the world. Since the late 80s i moved to live in Spain and since then I have not done any physical construction for others, finding it easier to tell others how to. So I became a madam and turned to writing, doing seminars and developing software etc. You can see more of my history and activities by looking at the following links in addition to a few posts that I have made on this forum, Homemade Tools built by tonyfoale - HomemadeTools.net . Although I seem to have gained the reputation as the chassis guru it has always been engines that have been a stronger interest.

I retired 4 years ago (60 now). But I spent my "prostitution" life designing avionics for Collins Radio (autopilot, flight management, serial data switches, and protecting against lightning and HIRF, as well as preventing the emission of RFI). I started the metal working bug in high school, back when they had metal working shop (all gone since the 80's in US public schools). I'm mostly self taught, but with recent problems, youtube has been unbelievable in showing surface plate 'tricks'.

I came to this site to get pointers on my missing knowledge.

[olderdan]

Tony I could not agree more with your comments on the use of hand tools, I use them a lot ,files, hacksaws, scrapers etc. I see so much taking a sledge hammer to crack a nut these days and very often the task is done by the time it takes to set up a machine.
By the way I watched on of your post grad seminars in spain on u tube and found your background work fascinating, what surprised me a little was the lack of technical questions, mostly about plastics and batteries, sign of the times I suppose.
Regards
Alan

[tonyfoale]

Tony.....
By the way I watched on of your post grad seminars in spain on u tube and found your background work fascinating, what surprised me a little was the lack of technical questions, mostly about plastics and batteries, sign of the times I suppose.
Regards
Alan

Alan, that was not one of my usual seminars, they are 2 to 3 day events. The talk in Barcelona was just a short presentation that I was asked to give to talk about my life with motorcycles, after I had given a course to engineering students there. It was organised by the university and open to anybody, there were a few notable engineers and designers there but mostly the audience was of a lowish technical level.
I mainly just do corporate seminars nowadays for concerns like tyre, suspension and motorcycle companies, some are filmed but only for distribution within the particular organisation. I am unaware that any such videos have escaped to the world at large.




Show time.

[tonyfoale]

I've recently purchased a China digital indicator 0.001mm resolution @12.5mm travel ($36, £29) which remarkable is pretty darn good so far. At least I have not seen any non-monotonic behavior in it's count. It seems to mimic a 2 micron resolution "Peacock" test indicator. I have no idea what method of digitization is contained in this battery operated indicator. It also has a SPC output port, so it could be read by an external computer for recording.

I did consider that option and I do have a cable on its way to me. BTW cables to plug straight in to the data ports are not common, few sellers have them, and many people just solder directly on to the terminals. There are several different data formats used in Chinese calipers etc. some use +ve earth others -ve earth, so check first. Some send data and clock pulses at a regular frequency. Some send bursts of 2x12bit data, others send BCD. Some use query and response methods. However, most formats are well documented on the net and Mr. Google will respond kindly if you ask nicely. It is just a matter of looking at the o/p to see which format your device uses.
On my camshaft reader i use a quadrature rotary encoder for angular position and I wanted to use interrupts to count the linear motion pulses and a quadrature linear encoder is the easiest way to link the two. This was the principal reason for going the encoder route. If I had had to pay dealer prices then I would have somehow worked out how to do it with a digital dial gauge. I wanted to do it all more or less automatically and before I fried the original encoder it took about 3 secs to get the whole profile measured and plotted. To do it manually using a rotary table to set 1 degree intervals and then reading and recording from a gauge would take around 2 hours.

[metric_taper]

BTW cables to plug straight in to the data ports are not common, few sellers have them, and many people just solder directly on to the terminals.

Tony, I found the same issue:
I tried several years ago to get one for the Mititoyo vertical mill quill digital indicator, and had zero luck finding a cable that could interface to some affordable SPC reader. I had only tried eBay. I was hoping there would have been an ISA card for the PC (now a PCI or USB card would be wanted). I did find a web site that discouraged me, with the lack of any data standard for the many digital scales out there (as you stated). If you can't get it into a data stream and captured in the PC, makes it tough to go the cheep route, as I don't want to fit the mill with ballscrews, and felt this would provide a feedback means of a low cost CNC.

Yes I could get some micro controller, but then I'd be spending many hours horsing around with software code, and that's not really how I want to spend my time these days.

Even finding a quadrature decoder/counter off the shelf requires a micro controller to read and transfer the data.

I'm whittling metal with out the CNC help, and at this moment, I have no project held up for this.

Steve

[tonyfoale]

Tony, I found the same issue:
I tried several years ago to get one for the Mititoyo vertical mill quill digital indicator, and had zero luck finding a cable that could interface to some affordable SPC reader. I had only tried eBay.

this the only offering I have been able to find worldwide. ebay.com 252491415529

Yes I could get some micro controller, but then I'd be spending many hours horsing around with software code, and that's not really how I want to spend my time these days.

i can understand that, but there is a lot of info on the net, as someone has worked out how to read each format. many use an Arduino as the interface twix PC and instrument. I find it amazing that most manufacturers fit the data port but provide no help with using it. A lost marketing opportunity I guess.

Even finding a quadrature decoder/counter off the shelf requires a micro controller to read and transfer the data.

That is so simple it is almost trivial. When I get my new encoder I intend to post something here including the Aduino code (Sketch as they call it)

[Saltfever]

In addition to a DI holder you'll want to provide for a way to mount a DTI, preferably one that reads to tenths. I simply tapped a hole into the side of my holder and mounted a cross-drilled rod that accepts the DTI stem. . . .

Very nice idea but I have only seen this used on critical bolting applications. Do you have a pic, or a brand that can be used in metrology? I assume Rennishaw, CMMs, and other probing applications use this idea but it appears to be imbedded in code and not readily visible the user. What DTI is available to use manually?

[metric_taper]

this the only offering I have been able to find worldwide. ebay.com 252491415529



i can understand that, but there is a lot of info on the net, as someone has worked out how to read each format. many use an Arduino as the interface twix PC and instrument. I find it amazing that most manufacturers fit the data port but provide no help with using it. A lost marketing opportunity I guess.



That is so simple it is almost trivial. When I get my new encoder I intend to post something here including the Aduino code (Sketch as they call it)

The Mitutoyo, a 5 pin:


And
eBay item number: 172578890127 but no detail photo, to determine if this will fit.
And then there's bunches of cables at this site: Mitutoyo Spc Cable | Factory Brand Outlets
It's a job to figure out which will work. And then you still need to reverse engr. the pinout for data and clock, and then write a bit banger to decode the data stream.
I did that in my past life, it just is not something I want to do. If some simple PLC box with an interpreter language existed, that had 16+ I/O with quadrature decoders built in along with up/down counters, so you would not have to do interrupt driven code (did lots of that too), I could see working through to make some machine enhancement devices.

I bet Mitutoyo, does not want anyone to de-crypt their SPC port, as they want to sell the hardware and software. But your right, why wouldn't the low end of China manufactures want to do this, other then they too can sell the reader hardware, as it's useful for a DRO.

I have looked into the Arduino, but my interest in learning ANOTHER program language just does not 'titillate' me.

Just this morn, I was looking at how to get Mach3 to work on a computer that does not have a printer port. So I go down the path of GRex or ncPod (learned this was the path to USB), and this opens an enormous chasm of how ignorant I am to PC hardware. And then reading posts from a few blogs, my mind gives up. I want something super simple, download the code, plug in the interface card to a USB port, hook up the servos, and encoders, and watch the machine move the desired amount.

Then there's the CAD to learn, and how to build the G code from this. I have several dials that need to me made, so engraving with a 4th axis would be handy.
We'll see if I ever get there.

[DIYer]

Thanks metric_taper! We've added your Surface Plate Height Gauge Adaptor to our Measuring and Marking category,
as well as to your builder page: metric_taper's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

Surface Plate Height Gauge Adaptor by metric_taper

tags: holder, adaptor