Machine Shop Basics: Selecting Dial Indicators for the Machine Shop

hello Keith rocker here vintage machinery org so this past week a viewer of mine as well as a friend of mine Mike Heath who lives up in Crystal Lake Illinois not too terribly far outside the Chicago area Jeff asked me some good questions about indicators and I asked about put together a little short video kind of explaining some indicator basic so here's the situation Jeff recently purchased a metal lathe I know that he's on the metal lathe in the past as well as a milling machine I think he sold him and had a few come in and out but he doesn't have a whole lot of machinist tools and he's wanting to get geared up to be able to do some machine shop work he watches my channel he watches some of the other YouTube channels out there he sees indicators being used all the time but he's not really sure what he needs to get and as you can see just by what I have laid out on the table next to me there's a wide variety of indicators out there that you can get and they all have their pluses and minuses for different types of jobs and what we want to do Dave's just do a very basic introduction video to indicators what they do how they work some very basics on how to use them and if you're getting new starting this what kind of indicator do you need it's maybe a refresher for some of the more experienced guys out there this one is a more toward the beginners who are just getting started so let's come in here let me show you a selection of the indicators that I pulled out and we'll talk about some of them what they're used for and then go into what indicators you may need to get for your shop if you're just getting started so as I previously stated there's a wide variety of types of indicators that are out there and I went through my machine's chest out here and I just pulled out some of the ones that I have and some of them I use very frequently some of them I use very infrequently but sometimes some of these you just need for certain things so anyway let's get in here and talk about some we'll start out with just probably your most basic type of dial indicator and then this is just a regular plunge indicator where I'm not sure that the exact name for it I think that just goes by dial indicator but what it does is there's a stem here this one has a one inch range so the maximum range on it is one inch there's some gears and stuff that basically as this moves in you can see the dial moving and it gives you a very accurate measurement as to how far that dial is moving and this one is in thousandths of an inch so each one of the lines on here is one one thousandth of an inch so it's a division of one one thousandth of an inch they also make these in metric and yes I even have a metric one here so as another example this is a metric dial indicator and basically each rotation the dial is is one millimeter and each increment on the dial is 1/100 of a millimeter so it works exactly the same it's just calibrated for metric instead of inches and while most of my dial indicators that I have are English or in inches they basically work and perform the same new metric if you're a metric user you can choose to buy either metric or English units again I'm gonna probably be using English units because that's just what I work with why do you need one so if you're doing machinist work and you're doing a setup or your well probably for this one one of the most common uses would be dialing in up measuring the run-out on a lathe so you can dial in a four jaw Chuck and as you the less the pieces moving around you'll see that the indicator you know going back and forth wobbling and that tells you how much run-out you have and by making adjustments you can make that smaller and smaller and eventually get it down to where the dial is not moving at all so that is probably one of the most common things that I use one for so this type of indicator in my opinion is probably which should be probably the first one you get for most applications particularly on lathes if you're running a lathe get a good indicator like this another common question I get is what brand do i purchase does it really matter what brand purchase well I will tell you right away that I am a big fan of quality tools I believe that when you buy quality tools you buy them once you don't have to buy them over and over and over again and as such I'm generally not a big fan of buying a lot of the cheap import tools that come from China and Taiwan and places like that I prefer to spend my money on quality american-made a lot of European brands out there that are good quality metoya Japanese brand you know you're not going to go wrong buying quality but as a my one exception to that general rule might be with indicators and I'm still a big fan of quality I this is my go-to indicator to starett this is a model 25 - 341 measures to a thousandth inch that's the one that it's on my indicator stand most of the time I've also got this really nice Eames here that is another favorite of mine this is a really old indicator probably made in the 50s and I actually sent it back to Eames and have them rebuild it it's just such a quality instrument but you know this indicator here this stared indicator here you're probably looking at about a hundred and fifty dollars for a new one probably the same ballpark for this Eames you can still get the Eames whereas this one here this is a chars made in China and it's about 20 bucks big difference in price and I will tell you that I have been more than happy with this charts indicator this one here has a magnet on the back I use it a lot on the lathe I'll stick it down on the ways when I'm measuring something and it holds up well and when you're looking at twenty dollars versus one hundred and fifty dollars you can buy a lot of $20 indicators this one here it's going to wear out it's going to break a lot quicker than the starett under normal wear and tear conditions there's no doubt about it but indicators quite honestly can sometimes get a good bit of abuse you know they're only indicator standards laying around they get knocked over they get banged up and while I wouldn't necessarily call them a disposable item in the machine shop an argument could be made that yeah they are kind of disposable so you know a twenty dollar chars indicator will do you well as well as a lot of the other imports Harbor Freight some of those guys you know the quality on them I don't think is quite as good but it's probably good enough for most applications so if you're looking to save a little bit of money on your first indicator go ahead and buy a lower quality one and then as you get more deeper into the Hobby and have an opportunity to pick up a more expensive one pick up something like a stearic I'll also say that if you buy a good name-brand indicator like the stereo door Ames or some of the other companies that are still in business you can buy a used one online and very often for pretty cheap and even if you have to send these off and have them rebuilt you know when you send them off and have it rebuilt you basically have a brand new indicator again and the cost of getting a new Taiwan these indicators rebuilt it's probably about half the price of a new indicator that's a good ballpark so if you know it's $150 indicator you're probably going to spend 75 bucks having a complete rebuild done on it but again when you get it back you basically have a new indicator so that's another way that you know if you want to take a chance on buying a used indicator you know keep that in mind that hey if something is wrong with it about half the price and news about what it's going to cost not going to either send it back to the factory or you can send it off to one of the many services out there that such as long in Long Island indicator that does rebuilds on a lot of brands and they do an excellent job so type one this is definitely a type of indicator that I would recommend you know the main thing is to get a decent one you can save a little bit of money there so you bought your first indicator that's great but you're only partway there the next thing you really need to have is a good indicator hold or something that's going to hold this indicator to allow you to use it and for various setups that you may have now so here's an example here's my indicator and we'll put it in the holder and now this is going to hold it and I can position this indicator pretty much any way I want it to come in and indicate on whatever part I want so I told you you could save a little bit of money on your indicator if you want to your indicator holder is a totally different story you need to get a good quality indicator holder you can have the most expensive and accurate indicator in the world but if you have a crappy holder that's mounted too that's not going to hold that part that indicator nice and still and steady the indicator doesn't matter it's useless you can't use it so this is where you want to make sure that you do not cut corners now and as an example when I was first getting started in this many years ago I bought this little snake Type Indicator holder I had actually used one I'm not necessarily saying don't get this type because I have used like a good starett before that was excellent this one here's a cheap import and no matter how hard I try it just will not hold an indicator steady enough for it to be useful in my opinion this is garbage this was this is money that was wasted I could have spent it on something good what I typically use and there's a lot of indicator holders out there on the market but what I highly recommend and I think if you watch a lot of the other channels on YouTube pretty much everybody now is using these Noga indicator holders and this is an absolutely high quality indicator holder you're not going to find anything better on the market there are copies out there I haven't tried them I don't know how well they work they're probably similar but I'm telling you guys spend your money and get a good indicator holder the nagas are absolutely wonderful you just loosen that dial up and you can position this thing any way you want to and then when you tighten it back up it locks back down I've even got this great big one here I quite honestly use this some more for holding a camera than I do an indicator but sometimes if I in some applications I will pull this out and use it for an indicator holder as well but Noga remember that just go buy one save your money they are a little pricey you know this this indicator holder I'm guessing it's probably around 120 to 175 dollars depending on which one you get and what features you have they make one that has a fine adjust up here in the top they make one that has this fine adjust in the bottom for this type of indicator even though I have the one that are just in the top I like the one just in the bottom better and you can look at the options on those the final just on top does work better in other applications but for this type of indicator that's what I recommend I'll leave this indicator on this Noga indicator holder most of the time it doesn't even come off it just stays on there when I need it I go grab it it's ready to go so anyway this right here is your first type of indicator that I would highly recommend that you get four basic machine shop work particularly working on the lathes and also on the milling machine so the second type of indicator that I think that most people are going to need for just basic machine shop work is a good test indicator it's a little bit smaller indicator has a smaller range of movement than the the regular type of dial indicator and this one here most of them have just a little small probe on the bottom and again for doing more very fine adjustment work so this particular set here is a stearic called a best our last word last word indicator set and quite honestly this is probably my go-to indicator set for doing test work not because it's necessarily the best indicator on the market but because it's in this nice set that has all the little attachments for mounting it and you know for a lot of things this is it's nice to have everything in one place quite honestly some of these other little test indicators are probably a little bit more accurate than this indicator but again I like this as a set comes in a box you can buy just the indicator but if you if you try to find one get the whole set that has all the pieces in it it'll make your life a lot easier for a lot of the things you'll use this particular indicator on so the last word indicator here that I have it's in increments of one thousandths of an inch so if you're using it for something like setting up trimming in a vise on a milling machine thousandth of an inch is fine you come over to this one this is a brown and sharp best test indicator and it actually has a increments on it to a half thousandth so there's a big line and there's a small line in there that small line is a half thousand so basically does the same thing it's a got a little probe down here in the bottom and it works basically the same way but this one here the increments on it I go to a half thousand and there are times when you will need to go that fine but for most applications a thousandth of an inch is plenty I would say if you're new getting started and you're just looking for an indicator you know something like this last word you're not going to go wrong even though it's going to a thousandth of an inch and you get over to this one this is another Brown and sharp best test this one here actually will indicate to a ten thousandth of an inch some very very fine adjustments on here movements on here it only has about ten thousands of play in it so it's for very fine adjustments but it will go down to ten thousandth of an inch now this one here is probably more used on a surface plate for doing very very fine measurements it has its place and I'm not saying don't get one or you'll never need one but for the guy getting started in the machine shop this is probably measuring at a level that you probably don't need to be measuring at unless you're doing something like tool and die work very very accurate tool and die work so again you know the you can get different resolutions but for the beginning machine is getting started something goes to a thousand that's more than adequate these indicators you can also mount like on your Noga to hold them but again I really like this set and you know there are other brands out there that have similar things but to have the little accessories in here probably the biggest thing I use this for is trimming in a vise on the milling machine and the nice thing is is that I can pull out this little piece right here that fits up in a collet on the milling machine come in here whoops put my indicator on that little arm this goes in the collet on the milling machine and now I can swipe this back and forth along the face of my vise and very easily indicated in and I have everything I need in this set to be able to do it and it has a lot of other attachments in here for other types of setups but that's the real handy one this one here you can mount that like in a lathe it's almost like a tool bar or you can put in a vise or whatever mount your indicator down here on the end there are other holders in here for other applications as well anyway a good test indicator another one that I would get again for a beginning machinist think of training in a vise on the milling machine I actually shot a video a while back doing that I'll put a link up if you're interested in seeing this last word indicator in use and I'm not saying the last word it's the best one out there but for a good beginner set this is again my go-to test indicator that I use all the time so this is another indicator I want to show and I don't necessarily think this is something that most people are probably going to need at least not right away but if you get an opportunity to get one this is a handy indicator and I don't use it a lot but when I need it man it's a nice set and this is a this is a starett number 196 of this particular indicator I'm not sure what the set is it may also be 196 but this indicator instead of having the plunge on the bottom it's a back plunge indicator so you got a plunge back here on the back that moves in and out and when it does of course it moves the dial on here this one also measures to a thousandth of an inch and it comes in a nice set again for doing all kinds of fancy setups you got clamps that you can mount it on to bars you can you know use these in your milling machine or what have you I got some snugs in here this is a real nice feature for this as well you can set this up like this with this rocker and now this can actually go down inside of a hole it's an inside hole attachment so this can go up into a tiny little hole and it moves the indicator so that's really nice for doing a little small hole they also make a hole attachment that goes on a regular and indicator I'll show one of those in a minute but nice set here has a couple of different tips that you can put on there for different things again probably not one that I use a lot but sometimes you just need one of these and you can use this for also trimming in a vise on mill machine you just mount this right into your milling machine put that up in the Arbor and then you come in here and run this up and down the jaw and your Chuck and it does the same thing I don't like using this one for that application just because you got to have the vise open real wide to get it down in there and the actual indicator is down below the surface where as a test indicator you know the dial is well above the area that you're indicating off off but it will work for that back plunge indicator another nice indicator to have so here are a couple of attachments that you can get to go on your indicator as well so this is an inside hole attachment this kind of very similar to one we showed on that back plunge indicator it just fits up over the shank and clamps down here onto the barrel of your indicator and it works the same way so now you can take this up inside of a little small hole and it will indicate and let you know how it's working in there so that one just for going up in a hole this one here is a similar thing but this is more we've got a right angle on there so instead of going straight in it's at 90 degrees and it just pivots on there just like such and allows you to get up into some tiny places so you got a little flange on lathes or something you need to indicate in sometimes these little indicator attachments inside hole attachments or what have you work very well so this one here is a 670 B and a starett number and this other one is a 671 if you want to close up very handy to have those functionality just dial indicator doing special another thing that I'd highly recommend is get a selection of tips that you can put on these indicators so this little tip on the bottom will unscrew and you can grab all kinds of different little tips to go on here depending on what you're indicating on so for example there's one it goes to a point you know we've got some that have some extensions on there just all kinds of different tips on the bottom that make it real handy for doing odd jobs I really like these little button end ones too for sometimes you're going to have a really big surface that you're indicating off of so they make a little button tips as well that will fit on these so there you go guys a basic introduction to indicators and what type you might want to be looking out for if you're getting new into this hobby or this business and need to get a good indicator - there are a lot of indicators out there so hopefully this will help you make some good selections as you're investing in your shop and getting some good tooling to put to use we'll talk to you later you

Channel: Keith Rucker - VintageMachinery.org

Views: 78,635

Rating: 4.9327903 out of 5

Keywords: Machine Shop, Machinist, Tools, Dial Indicators, Starrett, Ames, Brown & Sharpe, Best Test, BestTest, Last Word, Indicator

Id: zH8I_LwhFVE

Length: 21min 44sec (1304 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 04 2016