543- TDS-3 DRO on a Optimum BF 20L mill. (Ruud - The Netherlands)

Thanks Ruud living in The Netherlands for sharing with us his TDS-3 LCD DRO on his Optimum BF 20L Mill.

The scales used are travel length 220mm, 420mm and 520mm.

It is a great job and paying lots of details in the installation.

Below are from his original email :

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Scales on Optimum BF 20L mill.

X axis, mounted directly to the front of the table without using any spacers.

The sensor head of the X axis is mounted directly to the base of the Y axis with two allen bolts. In the picture you can see that the scale of the Y axis is raised with a small aluminium block. This block came with the dro, I only made the hole in the block a little bit larger to be able to move the scale up and down a little bit.

As the 220mm scale (total length 362mm) is longer than the base of the mill I made a bracket to extend the base at the back. The bracket is made from one of the angle plates that came with the dro.

The sensor head of the Y axis is mounted with a aluminium plate bend to the correct angle. A peace of aluminium is used as a spacer.

The scale of the Z axis is mounted directly to the column of the mill.

You can just see the aluminum foil I used to get the correct alignment.

The sensorhead of the Z axis is mounted to the head of the mill with a aluminium plate milled to the correct dimensions.

The cables of the scales are ty rapped to the back of the bracket of the display. The ty raps go through holes drilled in the bracket.

The original aluminium bracket is mounted to ta home made bracket. This bracket is made from a piece of angle iron with the U part of the original bracket welded to it. I welded some small brackets to the back of the bracket to hold the cables in place, while in the mean time the cables can still move back and forward when the display is rotated.

It shows an extra bracket I made to guide the cables.

584-DRO-2LC- China Generic Lathe -Victoria- Australia (Peter DEAN)

Message from Peter:

The goods arrived very quickly in perfect condition and I fitted them to the lathe without much trouble although I did make a couple of extra brackets myself.

Had to go away Interstate for a few days then when I got back I saw your email pointing to the Blogsite that suggested a few different ways of fitting the slides.

These gave me some new ideas on how to simplify the install and mount both slides facing down to prevent cuttings getting on them.

Attached are a few photos that I took that you are welcome to use.

The lathe is a 10 year old generic Chinese lathe that I am sure there are at least a million others out there very similar! I removed the rear covers to fit the parts and take the photos.

I decided to mill an aluminium bar to hold the cross-slide transducer as I was restricted front and back by the saddle clamp bolt at the back and the lubrication hole stopper at the front.

The scale was bolted to the cross-slide and the transducer kept stationary. This makes it easier to clamp the cables as the cable from the cross-slide and saddle now both move together. To hold the cables more firmly I fitted a length of aluminium angle to the bottom of the brackets holding the saddle transducer.

The saddle scale is simply bolted onto the back of the lathe bed.

So the only extra parts I had to furnish were the milled bar and a couple of spacers for the cross-slide, a short length of aluminium angle, a couple of 2mm shim plates for the lathe bed scale and a 5mm nut. All the rest was in the supplied kit.

The readout is rock steady and clear. I was surprised at how steady it is.
If the lathe is running with an out-of-balance item and vibrating a bit, there is the occasional flicker of the last digit but it is still very precise and easy to interpret.

Overall I am delighted with the system and the excellent service from the DROStore.

Kind Regards,

Peter

622- Harrison M300 lathe with MEA-2 / TECH-2i DRO by Garry (Essex - United Kingdom )

Thanks to Garry for his photo of Harrison M300 lathe

He had bought the MEA-2 / TECH-2i and using F5-220mm and E5-820mm scales

BLOG - 488- TDS-2B on 13" Southbend, circa 1947 Lathe -- Sherri (USA)

Thanks Sherri from USA (FL) for sharing with us the TDS-2B DRO on 13" Southbend, circa 1947

Photos from Sherri:-

Anyway, I proceeded with the installation and got side-tracked with cleaning. So, here are the pictures you asked for.

Captions:

0869.jpg -- Here's an overview of the lathe, a 13" Southbend, circa 1947 or so.

0870.jpg -- This is a view of the x-axis. Note how the custom bracket I made mounts to the taper attachment and places the x-axis scale and transducer farther away from the work piece. This installation would interfere with the follow rest mounting, if I had one.

0871.jpg -- If you look closely in the shadows of the brown shelf, you can see I found an alternative use for the z-axis scale protective cover. It is now serving as a cable raceway, providing additional protection to the transducers armored cable.

0872.jpg -- A picture of the z-axis scale with the taper attachment in the distance. It doesn't show very well in this picture, but the lathe's saddle ways overhang the scale considerably. I opted to mount the scale as high as possible to make use of the protection offered by the overhang, instead of using the aluminum extrusion you provided in the kit. The taper attachment helps protect it as well and was ultimately crowding the installation of the provide scale cover.

0873.jpg -- The upper scale is the x-axis with the transducer mounted stationary. The lower one is the z-axis where the scale, itself is mounted stationary to the lathe bed casting. This picture show the z-axis transducer and all cable straps mounted to the underside of the taper attachment.

0874.jpg -- Another look at my custom x-axis mounting bracket.

Thanks for sharing your photo , Cheers

481 - YunNan Lathe with TDS - 2B, Quebec, CanadaB

Thanks to Gilles for the photo of TDS-2B DRO installed on a Yunnan Lathes.

Here is what, Gilles says:"

Hi, heres are a few pictures of my DRO installed on the lathe, im super satisfied and will recommend you to all my contacts, will order soon for my new milling machine. take care"