beckley23
Titanium
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2003
- Location
- Louisville, KY, USA
For those of you unfamiliar with the installation of a DRO, on a lathe, I am posting these pictures and comments.
The first DRO I installed was a Mitutoyo on a Bridgeport many years ago. It was a royal PITA, all the hand cranking to align the scales, etc. The DRO's at the time had glass scales, as do many today, and their construction necessitated the installation procedure. The next DRO I bought for K&T mill was a Newall, and the dealer installed it as part of the sale. Newall was new on the market then. I figured let them do it, if they want to, and after the MTI, I wasn't looking forward to it. The installer had the installation in less than 3 hours.
After watching the installer, and using the Newall for some time, I became a Newall fan. For me these DRO's are basically bullet proof. They survive chips, oil and a lot abuse, and they are very easy to align, although as I have found out they can be troublesome to mount on quite a few machines. I have made or adapted many of the mountings for reader heads. I have a feeling that many of the other brands would be the same, once you get away from the standard Bridgeport types. If you want know why some installations take a long time, and others don't; its the mountings.
Anyway, the mounting on the EE was easy, and pretty straight forward, with little custom fabrication, the display mount, or slight modification to some of the furnished hardware.
There are nine pictures, that I'll post in 2 postings.
1. Microsyn reader and scale installed yesterday. Note the scale mounts, these are very easy to adjust. The reader is installed first and aligned vertically and horizontally + - .002". For the Microsyn, Newall supplies an alignment bar, you don't use the actual scale, that goes in the reader. The screws are tightened as you spin the bar. The object is to be able to spin the bar in the reader while you are locking the hardware in the scale mounts. The Microsyn scales are not clamped in the scale mounts, instead there a screw that threads into one end of the scale through the mount and keeps from moving and the other mount use a plastic set screw to keep that end from moving around.
2. Indicating the Spherosyn reader head. Note the large difference in size from the Microsyn reader. As a testament to Monarch, the horizontal alignment was + - .0005" from the get-go, the vertcal needed some adjustment. To facilitate adjustment, I used an inspection mirror while cranking the carriage.
3. Spherosyn scale and reader installed.
4. Details of the Microsyn reader mounting. The slots in the angle bracket made adjustment easy.
5. Routing the cables. Give some consideration this. You don't want pinch points, snags, etc.
6. More routing the cables. I routed the cables this way, because I don't want them dragging in the pan and getting snarled in chips. It would have easier to let them stay in the pan, and go out the other way.
7. The display mount. This is the only item I had to fabricate.
8. It's alive. Note the reading on the Z axis. This is the total carriage travel on the 30" machine.
9. Details of the Spherosyn scale mount.
Harry
The first DRO I installed was a Mitutoyo on a Bridgeport many years ago. It was a royal PITA, all the hand cranking to align the scales, etc. The DRO's at the time had glass scales, as do many today, and their construction necessitated the installation procedure. The next DRO I bought for K&T mill was a Newall, and the dealer installed it as part of the sale. Newall was new on the market then. I figured let them do it, if they want to, and after the MTI, I wasn't looking forward to it. The installer had the installation in less than 3 hours.
After watching the installer, and using the Newall for some time, I became a Newall fan. For me these DRO's are basically bullet proof. They survive chips, oil and a lot abuse, and they are very easy to align, although as I have found out they can be troublesome to mount on quite a few machines. I have made or adapted many of the mountings for reader heads. I have a feeling that many of the other brands would be the same, once you get away from the standard Bridgeport types. If you want know why some installations take a long time, and others don't; its the mountings.
Anyway, the mounting on the EE was easy, and pretty straight forward, with little custom fabrication, the display mount, or slight modification to some of the furnished hardware.
There are nine pictures, that I'll post in 2 postings.
1. Microsyn reader and scale installed yesterday. Note the scale mounts, these are very easy to adjust. The reader is installed first and aligned vertically and horizontally + - .002". For the Microsyn, Newall supplies an alignment bar, you don't use the actual scale, that goes in the reader. The screws are tightened as you spin the bar. The object is to be able to spin the bar in the reader while you are locking the hardware in the scale mounts. The Microsyn scales are not clamped in the scale mounts, instead there a screw that threads into one end of the scale through the mount and keeps from moving and the other mount use a plastic set screw to keep that end from moving around.
2. Indicating the Spherosyn reader head. Note the large difference in size from the Microsyn reader. As a testament to Monarch, the horizontal alignment was + - .0005" from the get-go, the vertcal needed some adjustment. To facilitate adjustment, I used an inspection mirror while cranking the carriage.
3. Spherosyn scale and reader installed.
4. Details of the Microsyn reader mounting. The slots in the angle bracket made adjustment easy.
5. Routing the cables. Give some consideration this. You don't want pinch points, snags, etc.
6. More routing the cables. I routed the cables this way, because I don't want them dragging in the pan and getting snarled in chips. It would have easier to let them stay in the pan, and go out the other way.
7. The display mount. This is the only item I had to fabricate.
8. It's alive. Note the reading on the Z axis. This is the total carriage travel on the 30" machine.
9. Details of the Spherosyn scale mount.
Harry
