Scale and callipers

[hazelman]

Hi all,

What scale and calipers do you recommend ?

[Peter]

Please do an Ebay search it is pennies rather than £

[Coinery]

The scales I use are Fuzion FZ-100

Capacity 100g in 0.01g increments! They have been 100% reliable for years, weighing 0.5g coins with exactly the same reading 3-4 years later! unbelievable scales, I'd buy exactly the same ones if they failed tomorrow!

Micrometers are tricky! I've been through a few pairs now, and always had to put up with inconsistent and unreliable performance from them. I finally ended up buying a very specialised and expensive pair from an engineering company! Most 'disposable' models would do, just depends on how important the figures are to you?

[Peter]

Buy from HK simples

[Rob]

Buy a good old fashioned manual micrometer. Digital ones rely on a variable resistance which is highly susceptible to erroneous readings due to crud. The smallest amount of lubricant to make the slide work smoothly will also cause airborne matter to stick. This will eventually screw up the readings by giving either a higher resistance if the crap is an insulator, or lower if conducting. A manual reading only requires the temperature to be roughly constant from one reading to the next.

[Coinery]

Buy a good old fashioned manual micrometer. Digital ones rely on a variable resistance which is highly susceptible to erroneous readings due to crud. The smallest amount of lubricant to make the slide work smoothly will also cause airborne matter to stick. This will eventually screw up the readings by giving either a higher resistance if the crap is an insulator, or lower if conducting. A manual reading only requires the temperature to be roughly constant from one reading to the next.

It's a bit of a dark art reading the manual ones! I 'got' my lesson at the boatyard, much to the amusement of everyone present!

[Rob]

Buy a good old fashioned manual micrometer. Digital ones rely on a variable resistance which is highly susceptible to erroneous readings due to crud. The smallest amount of lubricant to make the slide work smoothly will also cause airborne matter to stick. This will eventually screw up the readings by giving either a higher resistance if the crap is an insulator, or lower if conducting. A manual reading only requires the temperature to be roughly constant from one reading to the next.

It's a bit of a dark art reading the manual ones! I 'got' my lesson at the boatyard, much to the amusement of everyone present!

Not for those of us brought up to use a slide rule

[Coinery]

Ah, yes, I keep forgeting you are so much older than me!

[hazelman]

Thanks guys on reflection i asked myself why im not supporting pre-decimal so have ordered

[Coinery]

Nice one!

[azda]

Reading the manual micrometers are a dark art, using them without a small stand can also bring a variable reading and I guess this is why people go for the digital. Most engineering companies I've worked with use mitutoyo

[Rob]

Reading the manual micrometers are a dark art, using them without a small stand can also bring a variable reading and I guess this is why people go for the digital. Most engineering companies I've worked with use mitutoyo

Mine's a Mitutoyo too. Best tool for the job. Had it roughly 30 years with no sign of a problem.

[Rob]

Somewhat off topic, but seeing as we are talking about Mitutoyo, I have at least a couple dozen spare Mitutoyo micrometer drives in two sizes which I will offload at bargain prices if anyone is interested. They are currently attached to a 20.5mm AEI high vacuum flange with sealed bellows to provide linear adjustment under vacuum, but can be easily removed to leave just a micrometer with central adjustment bar having at least an inch of linear adjustment..

Take the image below and it splits at the first line on the stainless part. In the unlikely event of anyone wanting to use them on hi vac kit, they are good to at least 1 x 10e-8 mbar, but realistically should do at least 3 orders of magnitude better.