I gave up trying to find the components to add the "fine feed" option to a Super 612 I'd just finished getting back into action( it had been involved in a tip over long ago, and sat unused, until the last guy to own it kindly gave it to me ). Anyway, finding the parts wasn't looking good, and a guy on another forum had commented why not just stick a DRO on it instead? Seemed like a good idea, and I had already started watching ebay for components. Wound up finding a NOS Acu-Rite ENC150 1uM encoder, still in the factory box. Followed by an old but in good shape Quikcount display. All in for a little over $200 with shipping. The shocker came when I thought I'd just order the factory Harig mounting kit that Acu-Rite still offers, then saw the price. Depending on the vendor, retail is $400-$500 for a glorified V block and hose clamp! I needed an excuse to learn how to use a rotary table, and wound up making my own mount.
I had concerns that having the reader head mount attached to the motor housing, was going to transfer vibration and cause the least significant digit ( half tenth increments in this case ) to jitter but its rock solid. There's a little blip when you turn on the spindle, but it immediately settles back to where it started, and then never varies. The dust collector running has no effect either. Big relief there. Used a 6" Jo block to set the error compensation in the Quikcount, and it measured the 6" gauge to within a tenth and a half. Pretty good for 20+ year old instruments.
I had concerns that having the reader head mount attached to the motor housing, was going to transfer vibration and cause the least significant digit ( half tenth increments in this case ) to jitter but its rock solid. There's a little blip when you turn on the spindle, but it immediately settles back to where it started, and then never varies. The dust collector running has no effect either. Big relief there. Used a 6" Jo block to set the error compensation in the Quikcount, and it measured the 6" gauge to within a tenth and a half. Pretty good for 20+ year old instruments.
