Thread: DRO Decisions - Easson VS Sino

Gday All,
Long story short, I'm a machinist and have recently set up a home workshop to do some hobby work and jobs on the side. I have a Colchester Student 1800 Lathe and Hartford Bridgeport clone mill. Both need DRO's. Having recently bought both machines, and also my first house, I am watching the $$ but also don't want to buy junk.
I already have an Easson ES-10 lathe 2 axis DRO Display I picked up ages ago second hand, so it makes sense to buy some Easson Scales to suit, and set that up on the lathe.
For the Mill, I had planned to buy an Easson ES14 3 axis display from Hare and Forbes for $650 ($550 in their upcoming sale), and 3 scales to suit. That totals around $1400 to set up the 3 axis on the Mill. Recently however, I have seen they have been advertising these 'SINO XH-3P' 3 axis DRO kits for $550 (see link below), that includes the 3 scales to suit, and mounts etc. It also looks like they are now fitting and selling these on a lot of their Hafco machines. They look a lot like most of the other chinese DRO's on ebay, aliexpress etc.
Considering both come with 1yr warranty, and are both made in china, its hard to justify paying double the money for the Easson setup. I have heard mainly good things about Easson's, and nothing about the SINO. Other than the Easson display having an aluminium case, and the SINO being plastic, I cant see any major differences. Both have similar features, PCD functions etc.
My experience at work has always been with Sony, Heidenhain, Anilam and Fagor DRO's, all of which are well out of my price range.
If anyone has any advice or experience (good or bad) with Easson or Sino, or any other similar options I should look at, I would love to hear your opinion.

Link to the SINO Kit: https://www.machineryhouse.com.au/K5202

Link to the Easson DRO: https://www.machineryhouse.com.au/D7143

Cheers,
James

A lot of thoughts in this thread, there may be similar threads.

//metalworkforums.com/f65/t1992...sitance-buying

I have an absolute bargain basement 3 axis Chinese DRO on my bridgeport and damn that thing was a sound buy. The serial ports in the unit are pretty shonky but it works a dream, has held up to some abuse and has all the useful stuff like tool offsets and PCD. User manual is absolute garbage but it was like $350 delivered.

As you have already alluded to, Easson displays need Easson scales to work. The beauty of the Sino et al units is the scales are interchangeable, so you can mix and match scales - whether that is because you have a crash, swap things onto a larger machine or (like I have done) decided a lower profile scale would be less in the way on one axis.
I've had a Sino display and scales on my mill for 4 years now and while it is not used full time, I haven't had a problem with it.

Michael

I have both an Easson and Sino.

I probably prefer the Easson unit, but both units work as they should.

I bought one of these 2 axis kits 18 months ago. Out of interest I mixed and matched the Shenzhen scales and readouts with Easson 8 items to see what would happen and they all played nicely together.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/HXX-...410015009.html

Originally Posted by Michael G

As you have already alluded to, Easson displays need Easson scales to work. The beauty of the Sino et al units is the scales are interchangeable, so you can mix and match scales - whether that is because you have a crash, swap things onto a larger machine or (like I have done) decided a lower profile scale would be less in the way on one axis.
I've had a Sino display and scales on my mill for 4 years now and while it is not used full time, I haven't had a problem with it.

Michael

Originally Posted by Michael G

As you have already alluded to, Easson displays need Easson scales to work.

That's not the case. On a couple of the lathes, have Easson on Z - and the Sinos on the cross-slide (1 micron) with Easson displays on both. Sino scale is cheap and cheerful, verging on shoddy, but should last long enough in non-industrial use. Might be able to get them a bit cheaper than H&F, there was a seller on ebay, operating out of Singapore last I heard, that was several hundred less when I got them.

On the plus side, these Chinese scales and displays don't appear to get incompatible upgrades every few years a la Heidenhain.

Most of the chinese glass scales work perfectly on Easson & Sino readouts. They differ in quality such as some only have 1 lip seals while others have double seals. If you protect them with a cover and are careful with coolant they all should last a fair while. I have used both Sino and Sinpo & they both seem OK.
My Sieg Runnmaster 330x 1000 lathe was supplied with a chinese Delos Display which I really disliked. Menu driven whith many button presses to get anywhere. I have the original Easson ES12 vertical display on my mill and it is a dream to use. Dedicated buttons for the most common functions and functions like PCD are easy to access.The display is so good that I swapped out the Delos on my lathe with a new ES12B and coundnt be happier. I think that the Easson ES 8,10 & 14’s are now replaced by the ES 12 which has a graphical display. Easson ES12 displays are readily available on Aliexpress at good prices.
PS you can even connect Electronica S1 magnetic scales to a Easson with an adapter which I have done on the cross slide of my Lathe. Much smaller, easier to fit and coolant proof.
The last option I can suggest is that Ditron have released new cheaper mini magnetic scales( & readouts) that will directly plug into Easson (&Sino) displays.
Happy hunting
Ron

There is no reason nowadays for general purpose DROs to be expensive, they have morphed into little more than consumer electronics for machinists, they are getting closer to being a consumable like a toaster or an Aldi TV. The glass scales are made by the hundreds of metres per day, the scale readers are assembled by the thousand, the electronics in the display are commonplace, think the chip out of a $20 digital vernier combined with the chip from a $20 scientific calculator. There is no longer anything remotely high end or leading edge about DROs.

Once there were good reasons for DROs to be expensive, a lot of R&D had to be amortised, production volumes were low, electronic components were expensive, salesmen were employed to promote the new fangled gear. Companies still asking big dollars for DROs are living on mystique, their name and reputation, living on past glories.

Originally Posted by jt-precision

...............
My experience at work has always been with Sony, Heidenhain, Anilam and Fagor DRO's, all of which are well out of my price range.
.........................
Cheers,
James

I have a Sino DV60 on my lathe I wish to transfer to a mill ,it was bought about 3 years or so ago for the lathe as a 2 axes dro ,but has only the 2 Glass scales for the lathe ,there are xyz read out on the dro which seem to be working, if I fit to the mill with a new third glass scale would the dro and third scale work on the mill, not very clewy about this ,would appreciate any help.

Eddie

Yep if you add a third Sino scale it should work just fine.

Eddie just take the plug out of the y port and plug it into the z port and make sure that it reads on that before you go to all the trouble of swapping it over....

Thank you both for your repiy ,I will try the obvious,many thanks

Well I had all ready remove the Dro from the lathe as I did not use it a lot and I didn't do what I should have done ,checked whether the z worked, it don't, but can I still use the two scales I have
the x y and change over the scales just for the table to be more accurate.most of what I have done in the past few years, has been done on the lathe with a milling attatchment,but I need to upgrade.
Eddie

Well I am back again the problem is the change over from the lathe to the mill Dro,,the X on the lathe is y on the mill as you all will know but to just swap them over does not work ,is it possible to remove the moving reader part of the two glass scales and change them over.would that work .I am up the creek with this now,as I am hoping some one will know how to fix the problem and get me out of the mess I have made of this.
Eddie