I know there are forum members out there that have Arboga drill/mill's so though they might be interested in how I went about fitting a DRO with glass scales.

The DRO and scales came from Aliexpress arrived in good time and packaging was good enough, cost was $AU292, I ordered a 3 axis read out and 5 Micron scales of 500mm 250mm and 150mm lengths. I did an online conversion from Microns to Inches and found that 5 Microns is about 2/10 of a thou so didn't bother with the 1 Micron scales that were also on offer. Not only are the original X and Y axis graduated in 2 thou divisions (around 50 microns) I seriously doubt I could work to that tolerance anyway, if I can work to 1/2 thou (around 10 microns) tolerance I'll be very happy
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The package included mounting brackets and screws, You can see from the pics of the package that there were meant to be 3 packs of screws etc, no surprise that only 1 pack was included which meant a trip to the fastener shop, when doing things like this you never really know what exactly you'll need so you end up buying extra. There were only 3 angle brackets included and I thought I would need more, as it turned out that the X and Z axis scales needed custom fittings so I did in fact have one bracket left over.


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The X axis scale went on first as I needed to remove the table to get to the back of it to drill mounting holes, and as it was, it turned out to be the most time consuming as I wanted to have the use of an X axis lock/clamp. The pics show my solution and so far it works well but I expect the inevitable to happen and wear will creep into pivots.

My X axis scale was slightly longer than the table so I fixed a 10x50mm Al bar to the back of the table and mounted the scale to that. I wanted the read head to clear the gib adjusting screws so I first made a wooden bracket and used this as a template for an Al bracket.

The y axis was fairly straight forward, once agin I used a 10x50mm Al bar mounted on the mill base with 4 grub screws to get it aligned to the Y axis, I will need to make a custom cover.

The Z axis just needed a bit of patience to get it all aligned, the hardest part was bending the 12mm rod that moves the read head so it cleared the frame of the mill. There is a bit of radial play in the quill which can cause the Z axis reading to jump a few microns so I plan to fit a close fitting teflon bush to the depth rod where it passes through the casting

The read head cables are way too long and once my tractor chain cable tidy arrives I will probably end up shortening them.

My "custom" flexible covers that stop swarfe from getting into the dovetails are actually part of an old leather apron that I was saving for the day when I was going to try some animal bone/leather case hardening- they don't look real attractive but do a great job of keeping swarfe out of the dovetails


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