Anyone with a drokits setup? decent quality?

[PurpLev]

I think I have given up on the idea of CNCing my mill, and as such would like to add a DRO setup for it (was holding off on this as converting it to CNC would make the DRO pointless). funds are tight, and it looks like drokits (dot com) has some reasonable options. they use glass scales at 5micron (they have a 1micron option ,but I don't think I would need that level of precision for what I do), and size wise I think it'll extend somewhat from my table as the scale sizes are in 100mm increments (this will be going on a grizzly G0619 table mill).

looks doable, affordable, but am wondering about quality. don't want to drop all that $$ and be left with subpar readings that will be useless.

anyone with one of these DROS (mill or lathe doesn't matter, just curious about quality and functionality/performance)? how do you like it? pros/cons? issues? other?

thanks in advance,
Sharon

 

[davidh]

look at the for sale post I did last night. that may be your answer.

 

[PurpLev]

look at the for sale post I did last night. that may be your answer.

Thanks David,
I did see it as the post was well timed. however while those are magnetic scales and can be custom fit to size (I like that), I am not fond of the use of batteries, and would rather have a wall-powered unit with 1 power supply for all.

I also want to be able to hook up an edge finder to the DRO as well as be able to use some of the multi-dimensional features which the smaller units do not provide.

 

[ML_Woy]

I think I have given up on the idea of CNCing my mill, and as such would like to add a DRO setup for it (was holding off on this as converting it to CNC would make the DRO pointless). funds are tight, and it looks like drokits (dot com) has some reasonable options. they use glass scales at 5micron (they have a 1micron option ,but I don't think I would need that level of precision for what I do), and size wise I think it'll extend somewhat from my table as the scale sizes are in 100mm increments (this will be going on a grizzly G0619 table mill).

looks doable, affordable, but am wondering about quality. don't want to drop all that $$ and be left with subpar readings that will be useless.

anyone with one of these DROS (mill or lathe doesn't matter, just curious about quality and functionality/performance)? how do you like it? pros/cons? issues? other?

thanks in advance,
Sharon[/QUOTE

I purchased a kit from WWW.dropros.com and it came with glass scales, the and I am pleased with it. Nice thing was I could afford the price and the installation was easy.
It came with a set of brackets, of which I used some, and good instructions. Before I purchased I visited their "Brick and mortor" store to see all of their equipment. They showed me all
of their models and how they were installed on different machines. The magnetic scales are really nice, but more expensive, they had one scale operating in a fish tank that had
been there for many months, to show its' durability. You might want to consider their line of products.

 

[PurpLev]

Thanks.

I am familiar with dropros. they seem to have a really nice selection of quality units, however the cost of even their 'cheapest' glass scaled 3-axis kit is ~750 compared to the ~480 number that I am currently considering to be pushing the envelope (in my case obviously). sure wish I could fork out the $$$ for one of those magnetic scale kits, but for my hobby use, I simply cannot justify it.

I do appreciate all the comments and alternatives, so I hope I don't come off negative, but I am mostly familiar with the 'other' options, and am more interested in hearing if anyone has first hand experience with drokits units specifically.

on a side note, I just realized that none of those lower units (other than the Shumatech) have an input for a digital edge finder... oh well.

 

[tripletap3]

I did a in depth search on the drokits and the drostore.com and even E mailed a few people that I found that had them. I found very little information in my search but what I did find were 2 people that had used them and were very happy with them. No real complaints. I hate to say it (And I know you don't want to hear it so don't beat me up.) but the Chinese are getting pretty good at making some of this stuff.

Lots of good photos and info http://mtechdro.blogspot.com/

 

[Ray C]

Hey, thanks for turning me on to this place. It's about time we get a break from the scalp-hunters.

I've been threatening myself to put one on my lathe for a while now. Sure would be nice for tapers. I'd probably only be interested in 0.0002" resolution such as what's on my mill. Most of the time I don't pay too much attention to the last digit. All you have to do is breathe hard and it flickers.


Ray

 

[PurpLev]

I don't have a problem with chinese products in general - just with a select few. that's why I like doing my homework before shelling out the cash - can't win them all, but it gets you pretty far.

 

[sanddan]

I went with this setup as it has a 3 axis display so you can add the third axis at a later date. When first installed I had a battery powered DRO on the quill so this one covered the x and y axis. I did end up switching out the quill axis so all of the readouts were on the same monitor. I have an RF45 clone so did not see the need for z-axis on the column.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Digital-Rea...=BI_Heavy_Equipment_Parts&hash=item3a7f658647

 

[hman]

Thanks David,
I did see it as the post was well timed. however while those are magnetic scales and can be custom fit to size (I like that), I am not fond of the use of batteries, and would rather have a wall-powered unit with 1 power supply for all.

I have a Shars 3-axis DRO on my mini-mill
http://www.ebay.com/itm/XYZ-3-AXIS-...832?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item45effc83b0
(just for completeness), here's the 2-axis version; both work with any (AFAIK) magnetic scale:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/XY-2-AXIS-D...491?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item5195d29b5b
and was very unhappy with the battery situation. Though the display unit was powered by a wall wart, the scales still depended on batteries. Luckily, I found a thread on one of my Yahoo groups that pointed to a solution.

1. I soldered SMD capacitors across the contacts in the battery wells of the scales
2. Hard-wired the cables to the scales - (plugs seemed much too flakey), including both + and - power leads
3. Found an otherwise unused battery well in the display unit - 3 AA cells. Wired + and - leads here, with additional capacitors for noise suppression.

This has eliminated several problems, including scale jitter, has made battery changes much less frequent (AA cells have *lots* more capacity than coin cells!), and has made battery changes much easier.

Even for individual scales like the iGaging, you might consider a similar central battery setup. Radio Scrap sells a good variety of battery holders. You could also go with a wall wart of suitable voltage. My usual source for these is Goodwill - $1 or 2 is typical.

I don't recall the details of the capacitors, but can try to look this up if you PM me.

I also want to be able to hook up an edge finder to the DRO as well as be able to use some of the multi-dimensional features which the smaller units do not provide.

Unfortunately, not available with any "cheap" system I know of.

I still do it the "old fashioned" way - zero the scale when the edge finder "kicks", then move over by the radius of the finder and re-zero. Luckily, I'm not usually in a hurry when doing a homebrew project.

Best wishes!