Thread: Import vs Local DRO costs

Thats an unusual steady set up, I can see why you need to save space now. The tape directly to the cross slide might be the only option.

Dave

Hi Micheal,
I assume that steady has bolts on the other side of the carraige as well?

Did you read this page?

Two Part Magnetic Tape Support Profile - 300mm Length
"Or the tape and top cover can be mounted directly to the surface offering a very low profile height."
That would make your scale 2mm thick. You're set

Stuart

Hey Dave,
I recently decided to purchase an affordable DRO and put some hard earned pay pal money from ebay sales to use. After reading and deliberating on information obtained from various online forums, the majority if not all of which you have participated in, I decided to go with the SINO 2 axis DRO kit for my lathe. Almost exactly, maybe exactly what you recommended, I purchased a 1micron longitudinal scale and a 1micron slim scale for the cross-slide. It arrived in about 1 week from Hong Kong, pretty quick if you ask me. The only issue was that the slim scale wasn't shipped inside of the plastic bag and so it got all this styrofoam particulate crud all up in it. I contacted them and sent pictures and they apologized and said they would work with me if anything ended up being wrong. So far their customer service has been tops, they are very responsive. I plan on installing it this weekend and will document the procedure as well as roughly test out the accuracy to the best of my capabilities. My question however is, did your SINO setup come with a hollow tube for mounting the DRO? My kit only came with the DRO box which has four tapped holes, 2 each for a pair of angle brackets. I guess the buyer is responsible for everything else? It makes sense since everyone's applications are somewhat different, I just want to make sure I'm not missing something. Thanks as always.
-cj

Hi CJ,
Good to hear you bought a DRO, it will make a big difference.
Both the Sino and Meister guys are great to deal with, and you rarely have to wait more than 24 hours for a response.

With the arm are you talking about the main readout mounting arm? If so, lathe DRO's are usually mounted on the headstock so may not be supplied with a lathe one.
My Sino is a mill one and so is one of my Meister's, and the other Meister is a lathe/mill combo so I cant really comment on whether you should have got one, but unlikely.

I had my readout mounted on a temporary flat bar bracket attached to the saddle to see if I liked it for about a year, but ended up going back the the headstock as I liked it there better.

With fitting it, when doing the reader head on the cross slide, wind it all the way to the right and use a extension on a hand drill. It's easy enough to eye ball the extension to the lathe ways to keep it aligned. I used a fosterner bit extension (wood spade bit extension) to do mine because I had one here. The drill bit was a little small so I wrapped it with aluminium can to bring it up to size and locked in in with the 2 grub screws..
If you don't have one you can just mount a length of rod in the lathe and drill the end and add a grub screw.

I used a home made transfer punch to mark the reader head holes, just some mild rod turned down is good enough to mark the cast iron. If your worried about the reader head hole placement, drill a scrap of flat bar to suit and then clamp that to the carriage first. Or if you have to pack the reader head out to align it, mount the reader head onto a piece of flat bar and the mount the flat bar to the carriage. This will allow you to have slots in the flat bar to have a bit of movement for alignment.

I mounted my reader head toward the back and was able to bring the cable forward and then under the saddle and over the back.

When I installed the scales on the first mill I returned, I used 6mm Allen head bolts to mount them, but from then on I have always used 5mm as it gives you a little wiggle room which is need to get them right.

Look forward to pictures of your install, and if I can help in any way just let me know.

Dave

Here are some pictures to explain what I was talking about with the cross slide scale cable going under the carriage. I had to add my own plastic elbow to get it to bend that quick, but I slit the elbow so I didn't need to unsolder the cable.
I also added a cover over the reader head which extends up under the standard cover to stop anything getting in since the cover needed trimming to clear the saddle. It was not really needed, but is extra protection.



The tubing is what they call sail track over here. It has a slot down one side which allows you to undo the outer cover off the cable end (just a screw), slide it back a little and you can then slide the inner in followed by the outer. I found this stuff really handy for brackets etc to hold the cable. I comes in lengths and is shaped like a P with a slot down one side.


You can see my scale sits a little above the cross slide because it's a regular scale. The scale came level, but I then had to add the cover and a air gap for safety.


I used 100 x 10mm flat bar for the carriage scale because the Meister's never came with brackets.


Dave

Sweet, thanks for the pics. I heard a reply from SINO and I was supposed to receive a swing arm as they call it for the DRO. Woops, guess they forgot one small thing. They even sent me a picture of what I was supposed to receive. Anyways they asked for a picture of everything I unpacked and so I am going to send that to them tonight after work, they are very responsive and so that is a relief. It's to bad they forgot this because they are a long ways away. I may try to work something else out with them as it may be worth their while to refund some money rather than pay and arm a leg shipping something like this. Plus they will probably come down hard on the gent who forgot to include it. Anyways thanks for the info. As I mentioned I am going to try and really document this to death all the way from unpacking to installing and using. I will be sure to send you the doc and make it available to anyone else who might be interested. This will be my first DRO job but I am as anal about aesthetics as I am about functionality and so hopefully everything will come out tip top. I'll ttys Dave.
-cj

Hi,
CJ, could you post a link of what you got? its been at the back of my mind for a while, and i want to overhaul my Conrik once Blondie is done. Oh dear. so much to do and so little time.....

Ewan

I am sure they will work something out with you, after all they will have to pay a high postage anyway.

I am not sure about the set up of your lathe, but I just mounted a small piece of angle to the electrical box on the back left, and mounted the DRO stud to that.

When I installed my first DRO it took me about 2 weeks because I custom made all the brackets out of 10mm steel at all custom angles etc. When I exchanged the mill I took them all off and the new one come with one fitted, so they are all in the cupboard now.
Because this mill is from another manufacturer they wont fit the contours on this mill, what a waist of time that was, but you could have dropped a brick on those brackets and not hurt any scale.

I am not sure if you have seen the scale mount on the front of my mill table, but I would like to go back and add a steel angle over the top of my lathe one and still have the factory cover underneath. Every time I drop something down the back of the lathe I cringe in case it damages the scale. I left a good air gap and have never even damaged the cover, but it is something to think about.
I would mount the angle with a bolt in the centre each end and a grub screw above and below it, so it would also be an adjustable backing spar for the scale to get it into alignment. If you have had a look at the back you will see it's only been puttied up, so it's not a true surface to go off.
The grub screws screw into the putty until they find the cast below which makes the mounting a lot more rigid.

Dave

Here is a list of everything I received and uh I guess, didn't receive :

1)SINO 2-axis DRO, for lathe applications, SDS6-2V counter;
2) slim scale KA500, 170mm/6.7", effective travel, 1um resolution;
3) regular scale KA300, 920mm/36.2", effective travel, 1um resolution;
4) complete kit, mounting accessories will be included in the package;
5) shipping by Fedex or DHL, depending on availability.

I found them on ebay and here is where I started:

SINO 2 axis digital readout | eBay

I will post pictures of everything right out of the shipping box tonight.

Hi CJ

Here are a few photos of my 2 axis Sino DRO installation on my CQ6230 12x36 lathe. I used a slim line scale for the X axis and a regular size for the Y axis. To get a little more cable clearance, I decided to grind a tad off the corner of the carriage where the reader cable exits the reader head to cross over the carriage.

The X axis reader head mounts onto an aluminium packing block that I made which also incorporates a stop to make sure the tailstock does not bash into the scale or reading head.

The two screws with springs in the top of the Y axis bracket allow for some fine vertical adjustment of the reader head in relation to the scale.

Remember to remove the plastic packing brackets from the reader heads once you have completed the installation.

I had a few questions regarding setting up the control panel and e-mailed JJ in Singapore. He replied with the info within hours... good after sales service.

Hi CJ,
I thought he had the mill and lathe arm the wrong way about, and the pictures above prove that, the mill will have the longer arm. It doesn't look like he uses genuine Sino accessories because I can see a few differences like the arms are not solid like mine.

With the 170mm scale I would have recommended the 220mm which is the next size up. The reason for this is on these lathes you cant quite get the reader head in the centre of the travel, so you will have to move the scale itself back to align it.

I have a 200mm on mine because thats Meister's size, but I have to be careful if I wind the cross slide off the screw as if I go to far after that it could damage the scale by over traveling. This is only a concern if I am putting a 45deg on a job and have the compound swiveled around toward the light.

With the long scale just remember to mount it under the gap, I think from memory mine is about 10mm under it.


Bluerock,
Your install looks good,
I see you don't have the earth lead connected to the back of you DRO, you really should put it on as it helps not only protect you, but also the readout. It is only a simple screw terminal so you just slip a wire underneath and do it up, and then the other end gets grounded to the machine.

Dave

Hey Dave, thanks for pointing that out. I'll connect the earth up this afternoon.

Hi,
I just did the power supply in my XPOS3 on the lathe, so thats why I pointed it out.
Not sure if it contributed to it, but the Meister doesn't have a external ground wire and relies on the mount for grounding as it's connected to it inside. I had the readout mounted loose on the bracket as I made a new light for the lathe, and after running the wires I forgot to do it back up tight again.

All I know is I went to turn it on and nothing happened, but it worked fine the night before.
I contacted Kerwin at Meister and asked what checks I could do inside myself, and within 1/2 a day he got back to me with instructions. He told me to probe a few places for 5v and after doing that I found the power supply wasn't working, which is totally separate on the circuit board and only thing joining the 2 together are 2 solder joints, 5v+ and 5v-.
He suggested I could send it back to be repaired and I pay postage both ways, exchange the board with him, or run an external 5v power supply to it which he could also sell me.

I tried it on a computer power supply and it still works fine, but I really want it fixed properly instead of having an external power supply. It is only a simple power supply as far as components go, but it's a switch mode power supply so there are things you cant just simply test like the old style transformers.

I have spent the last 1 1/2 weeks looking up part numbers, identifying components and then looking up how to check each one so I can fix this myself. I did contact Ray (our resident electrics expert) the other night about suppliers and he steered me in the right direction and is familiar with the circuits.

It looks like this repair wont cost me much as it looks like it's only done the dual Schottky diode and the adjustable shunt regulator which are only $1.36 and $0.75, the postage is the most expensive being $15, but I will buy some other gear as that is a flat rate postage..

I will give full credit to Kerwin at Meister though, he has replied to all my emails promptly, and was not a type to say send it back and don't open it etc. This readout is 5-6 years old so he had no obligation to help me or fix it as warranty went out many years ago. Try that with an Aussie supplier and you wouldn't get far.

So as you can see it pays to take the precaution, I am not 100% sure it was because of the earth as it is earthed inside from the cord, but it may have been.

I was lucky I had the other 3 axis Meister BC10M in the cupboard from my old mill that I could replace it with for the time being, After having the readouts for so many years it would be hard to go back now.

Dave

The earth wire is now connected

I've read a lot of good things about Meister and it was a real toss up between the Sino and the Meister when I got my DRO.