Hi, I'd like to fit a cheap DRO system to my 6" lathe. With the potential error on the cross-slide scale being doubled I am concerned that if I use a typical chinese scale I will end up with less accuracy than I need (or can currently acheive with the dials). Would it be possible to run a cheap scale on the Y axis at the same time as running a better resolution scale on the X axis. I expect that I would use either a budget Asian 2 axis reader or a Shumatec. Any thoughts?
Regards Keith
The Chinese scales do have a resolution of 1" / 20480. That is about
1.2µm. The accuraccy is sometimes bad, but mostly a liear error that can be corrected. I don't know exactly how Shumatech handles averaging, but I think that he does a 3 times oversampling.Yes, for the Shumatech existst a QE to Chinese-converter. It's called QE100, IIRC. Lester has them.
The Asian DROs won't handle the QE scales (at least right of the box), because the glass scales need 5V to operate. The Shumatech has provisions for that.
BTW: The QE100 converter works with YADRO too. And YADRO does a 10 times (can be adjusted) oversampling and averaging.
Nick
Nick
Thanks for the info and your link looks a very interesting project. I must admit that your answer has shown me that I need to do a lot more reading/understanding before I embark on the project. It will obviously not be as easy as just plugging in and so I will need to consider if my idea is worth while when I may only save about =A3100 by using one cheaper scale. I'll just need to save a bit longer.
Best regards Keith
Yes, it really is worth considering -in the long run- to buy only glass scales. They are more expensive, but their prize is dropping. And they are more relayable, accurate and better protected.
I currentyl can't handle glass scales the way I'd like to do it, but I have already designed the schematics. But it will take quite some time to finish that project ...
Nick
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