I've wanted DRO for my Taig micro lathe for a few years now. I decided to roll the dice with iGaging scales and remote digital readouts. I've read mixed reviews, but the price is pretty low risk at about $85 for three 6' scales of eBay. I snapped a few pics of the build and a final pic of the cross slide. In order for the DRO to work properly, the modified digital calipers need to be attached at two points. The measuring end or '0' end of the arm is attached to the corner at the front of the movable cross side. Jul 24, 2016 Brian Benchoff July 24, 2016 If you have an old manual lathe, mill, or even a drill press, a digital readout (DRO) is a very handy tool to have. A DRO gives you a readout of how far you’ve cut. Homemade DRO setup for a lathe utilizing a pair of digital calipers. Diy Lathe Lathe Tools Homemade Lathe Homemade Tools Milling Machine Machine Tools Washing Machine Motor John Deere Tractors Digital. Dec 29, 2009 A Homemade DRO for the 7x Mini-Lathe By Rob on December 29, 2009 The DRO uses an inexpensive digital dial indicator that’s held in place on the apron with powerful rare-earth magents. The stop clamps to the top of the cross-slide and presses against the indicator’s plunger, which measures the movement of the cutting bit.

[Andrew] wanted a digital readout (DRO) for his mini lathe and mini mill, but found that buying even one DRO cost as much as either of his machines. The solution? You guessed it, he built his own for cheap, using inexpensive digital calipers purchased off eBay.

The DRO he created features a touch screen with a menu system running on an LPCXpresso, while smaller OLED screens serve as labels for the 7-segment displays to the right. The DRO switches back and forth between the lathe and mill, and while the software isn’t done, [Andrew] hopes to be able to transfer measurements from one machine to the other.

Diy Lathe Machine

In a very sweet touch, [Andrew] hacked cheap digital calipers to provide measurements for each axis, where they provide a resolution of 0.01mm. There are six daughter boards, one for each caliper, and each has a PIC that converts from serial to I2C, freeing the main firmware from dealing with six separate data streams.

Diy Lathe Machine

The DRO doesn’t have a case, [Andrew] has it positioned out of chip-range from either machine.

A previous DRO we featured in 2012 used an Android tablet as its display.