Mitutoyo indicator 513-402 & 513-473

It seems that the consensus on mitutoyo indicators is good. Im interested in the following two in particular from amazon. Does anyone have experience with these models and can they be expected to hold up to many years of use, or should i just hold off till another inexpensive new interapid pops up on ebay?

https://www.amazon.com/Mitutoyo-0-0...oyo+indicator&qid=1562383480&s=gateway&sr=8-4

https://www.amazon.com/Mitutoyo-513...dicator+.0001&qid=1562383832&s=gateway&sr=8-3

A few guys at work bought those, I wasn't very impressed. Plastic bezel and just doesn't feel very well made overall. I think one of them broke within a few months. Interapid are my personal favorite, with Bestest being second. I keep my Interapids at work since I'm an inspector, and my bestests came home to use with my vmc in the garage. As for long term durability, my dad has a couple of interapids that are probably as old or older than me (40). All just my opinion though, I'm sure others have their favorites too.

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They’re fine. I agree with Chris, nothing impressive either way.

I have Bestest, interapid, Mitutoyo, Fowler, and a few others. I prefer Bestest so all my good tenth indicators are that make. The .0005” are Mitutoyo and Interapid. The interapid is nicer and more compact so I save it for fine work, and the mitutoyos are for general mag-base and machine use. They’ve held up fine but I’m not generally spraying them with chips or coolant.

Only problem I’ve had in any of my DTIs is a tenths-reading mitutoyo where a loose lever pivot caused backlash in the reading.

You can’t go wrong with Bestest, Interapid, Mitutoyo, even Starrett (not the last words—those are trash). The mitutoyos and Starretts have thicker bezels than Interapid and Bestest, but still work well and have fine action and repeatability.

The better Mitutoyo in the coarser range is the 513-442. Its dial goes clockwise regardless of which way the probe is pushed, and it has a second hand showing where the probe is with respect to the total .06" range. The Interapids have the second feature, but not the first. I have an old Compac that has both features, but I think it has been discontinued. The Mitutoyo is a little larger than an Interapid, mostly in the thickness of the dial assembly. Yes, the bezel is plastic, but that does not bother me.

The Travers catalog page does not mention what I think is the best feature, namely that the dial always goes clockwise. Odd.

Link to Travers catalog.

Thx guys. My only experience so far has been with interapid as far as dti's. I guess when I get a new .0005 I'll just stick with that and for tenths pick up best test. As far as durability im sure interapid is rock solid.. I dropped one pretty hard a couple days ago, but just checked it with gage blocks rising and falling and still accurate

Glorifire said:

Thx guys. My only experience so far has been with interapid as far as dti's. I guess when I get a new .0005 I'll just stick with that and for tenths pick up best test. As far as durability im sure interapid is rock solid.. I dropped one pretty hard a couple days ago, but just checked it with gage blocks rising and falling and still accurate

Click to expand...

I don't intend to start a "my drop was worse than yours" but uh...

I had a guy use my interrapid indicator on an indicol holder to indicate a vise in. No problem, I let him use it.

He indicated it in, and then typed in the M-code that made the machine go home. Problem was, that Mcode also oriented the spindle, and that stupid machine would literally spin as fast as it could (12k rpm spindle) a few revs before settling into place.

Well wouldn't you know, The indicator flew off the indicol, hit the back wall of the enclosure, flew out of the top of the machine and landed about 20 feet away.

Only thing wrong with it (tested it extensively) is that it broke the stylus and cracked the crystal. Also a little dent in the body.

Fast forward 2 years. a newer employee needed it to do the same thing on the same machine. I TOLD HIM THE ABOVE STORY. I TOLD HIM NOT TO TYPE THAT M CODE. I SAID TAKE MY BABY OUT OF THE SPINDLE BEFORE DOING ANYTHING ELSE. 5 minutes later, I heard the same CRASH happen. Actually, the indicator landed within a few feet of where it did the first time...

THIS TIME, it needed to be serviced. Had it sent out and they replaced the spindle gear, maybe another gear. It had a dead spot in travel, still mostly worked after that.

Company paid for the repair, thankfully. Works perfectly again now.

The last crash was about 2 years ago. We got rid of that stupid machine...



As for the Mitutoyo indicator, I have one. Don't fancy it in any way, use it sparingly. I love their digital calipers and micrometers though.

I have a 513-504T which measures .0001" and I like it, I think it's nicely made.