Hi Folks,

Finally sunk some cash into one of these things. Thought people might
be interested to learn exactly what they get with one of these.
Feedback is always welcome!

The review:

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlitevssb.htm

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

"Ed Bennett" wrote in message
ups.com...
Hi Folks,

Finally sunk some cash into one of these things. Thought people might
be interested to learn exactly what they get with one of these.
Feedback is always welcome!

The review:

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlitevssb.htm

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

Nice Ad, Ed. I didn't know spam was allowed on this NG.

Max

"Ed Bennett" wrote in message
ups.com...
Hi Folks,

Finally sunk some cash into one of these things. Thought people might
be interested to learn exactly what they get with one of these.
Feedback is always welcome!

The review:

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlitevssb.htm

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

Ed, maybe the problem with problem reviews does really lie in your court!
Would the reviews and the whole perception of the TS-Aligner series be
different if they were originally name WS-Aligner (wood shop) or WM-Aligner
(woodworking machine)? The TS does lead the uninitiated to think your baby
is a one trick pony. Has any review stacked your product up against your
'competitors' doing anything other than a table saw alignment?

I do own one of your units and could not be happier.

TinWoodsmn

Ed,

The review is informative, but at the end you appear to be going on a rant
about your personal issues with Mr. Reilly.
To be blunt, it makes you look a bit like a kook. I think you would be
better off just sticking to the facts about the tool.

-Jack
http://zo-d.com/stuff



"Ed Bennett" wrote in message
ups.com...
Hi Folks,

Finally sunk some cash into one of these things. Thought people might
be interested to learn exactly what they get with one of these.
Feedback is always welcome!

The review:

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlitevssb.htm

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlitevssb.htm

My 2 cents - if I didn't already own the tool, the review would be
helpful to me in making a choice.

Owned the TS-Aligner for years, and to be honest, the SuperBar looks
like junk to me. You'd have to use the TS-Aligner to really understand
what a value it is. The parts are well designed and built to last. The
documentation is superb - from the manual to the video tape.

Don't know Ed... but I know his product, his service and support - and
it's second to none. Couldn't do w/out the TS-Aligner after using it
for so long.

As far as "Spam" goes - I learned about the TS-Aligner from this
newsgroup years ago - as I did Steve Knight planes. I'll always buy a
quality tool at a good price - their support and "spam" on this board
is just a bonus....

- jbd

On Sep 14, 9:57 am, "TinWoodsmn" wrote:
Ed, maybe the problem with problem reviews does really lie in your court!
Would the reviews and the whole perception of the TS-Aligner series be
different if they were originally name WS-Aligner (wood shop) or WM-Aligner
(woodworking machine)? The TS does lead the uninitiated to think your baby
is a one trick pony. Has any review stacked your product up against your
'competitors' doing anything other than a table saw alignment?

I think you make a good point. The name can be misleading to the
uninitiated.

The Wood Magazine review (9/03) did a competitive lineup and included
functionality on a wide variety of woodworking machinery. However,
most reviews do focus solely on the table saw and are limited to blade
and fence alignment. This is how the most recent one went (Woodsmith
8/07). They ordered a TS-Aligner Jr. (not the Jr Lite!). The two
other products in the article (SuperBar and A-Line-It) are pretty much
limited to table saw blade and fence alignment and were completely
outclassed by the Jr. Even so, the article included such phrases as
"...all three jigs work in the same way." and "...each of these jigs
does more or less the same thing...".

Were the comments in the Woodsmith article based on perception brought
about by the name? Not this time. I had included a two page
Reviewer's Guide along with the Jr. outlining the scope and purpose of
the product. There was a short cover letter pointing out the
Reviewer's Guide (as if it could be missed). One of the paragraphs in
the Reviewer's Guide reads:

"The TS-Aligner products are an overkill if they are used only for
table saw blade and fence alignment. They perform these functions
very well but are really designed to facilitate all machinery
adjustment with the precision and accuracy needed to eliminate test
cuts. So, comparisons with low cost or home made jigs that only
perform fence and blade alignment are not relevant."

Yet, that's what the article focused on and 70% of the Jr's
functionality was disregarded. Clearly, the Reviewer's Guide was
completely ignored (along with about 37 pages of the manual). They
did something else that was very curious. The photos in the article
show that they peeled off the Jr's product label. That's a new one!

I think that there are a lot of reasons why people get the wrong idea
about the TS-Aligner products. Certainly the name contributes to the
problem. But, I have to say that ignorance (both inadvertant and
deliberate) plays a big role especially with the journalistic types.
Maybe it's just me, but I just can't imagine writing a review without
fully disclosing all of the relevant information I know about the
product (and it's maker).

I do own one of your units and could not be happier.

Thanks Tim, I appreciate the good word!

Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

On Sep 13, 3:48 pm, "Max" wrote:

Nice Ad, Ed. I didn't know spam was allowed on this NG.

It's a review Max. Like most web sites that host reviews, it includes
some promotional materials as well. Most people can get the
information that they want from it and ignore the information that
they don't want.

On Sep 14, 11:14 am, "Jack Dahlgren" wrote:
Ed,

The review is informative, but at the end you appear to be going on a rant
about your personal issues with Mr. Reilly.
To be blunt, it makes you look a bit like a kook. I think you would be
better off just sticking to the facts about the tool.

-Jackhttp://zo-d.com/stuff

Thanks Jack, I appreciate the feedback. I waffle back and forth about
including the adventures I've had with Mr. Reilly. As I said in the
review, I've attempted to be very conciliatory concerning his
objections - and this was after I discovered him pirating the TS-
Aligner trade name with bad faith intent. He has published his
objections to me, my reviews, and my products on his web site. I have
reproduced those objections in the reviews with my commentary. I'm
not sure how that makes me look like a kook. I hope it helps people
understand the sort of person they are dealing with when they buy his
products.

Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

"Ed Bennett" wrote in message
ups.com...
On Sep 14, 11:14 am, "Jack Dahlgren" wrote:
Ed,

The review is informative, but at the end you appear to be going on a
rant
about your personal issues with Mr. Reilly.
To be blunt, it makes you look a bit like a kook. I think you would be
better off just sticking to the facts about the tool.

-Jackhttp://zo-d.com/stuff

Thanks Jack, I appreciate the feedback. I waffle back and forth about
including the adventures I've had with Mr. Reilly. As I said in the
review, I've attempted to be very conciliatory concerning his
objections - and this was after I discovered him pirating the TS-
Aligner trade name with bad faith intent. He has published his
objections to me, my reviews, and my products on his web site. I have
reproduced those objections in the reviews with my commentary. I'm
not sure how that makes me look like a kook. I hope it helps people
understand the sort of person they are dealing with when they buy his
products.


My recommendation is to take the high road. I agree with Jack that your
ranting at the end really make you look like a wacko.

I know that it hard not to want to correct misconceptions that some nutball
has about your products. One time I was representing a product on a PBS TV
Show. Before the show the host discussed some of the highs/lows of the
products and had a huge mistake about mine. When I told him the problem he
said that he would make sure to get it right on the air.

You can guess what happened when we went live. He make the same mistake and
you can hear me shouting No! I looked like a total raving lunatic.

On Sep 15, 7:48 pm, "Frank Drackman" wrote:
My recommendation is to take the high road. I agree with Jack that your
ranting at the end really make you look like a wacko.

I understand what you are saying - especially if someone just looks at
it and doesn't actually read it and follow what is being said. Based
on your comments, I have done some major revisions:

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlite_vs_superbar.htm

It may not be the "highest" road, but I believe that it is
considerably higher than before. I would be interested to know what
you think.

I know that it hard not to want to correct misconceptions that some nutball
has about your products. One time I was representing a product on a PBS TV
Show. Before the show the host discussed some of the highs/lows of the
products and had a huge mistake about mine. When I told him the problem he
said that he would make sure to get it right on the air.

You can guess what happened when we went live. He make the same mistake and
you can hear me shouting No! I looked like a total raving lunatic.- Hide quoted text -

Yep. These sort of situations are extremely common and almost
hopeless. You have an actor playing the part of an expert. He really
doesn't know the subject or the issues and probably would never
understand them no matter how hard he tried. He's got some idea in
his head and it just won't go away. Magazine reviews often take this
same bent (with a journalistic type playing the part of an expert).
It generally does no good to try and correct them.

My situation is a bit different. Mr. Reilly is being deliberately
malicious.

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

On Thu, 13 Sep 2007 14:35:56 -0700, Ed Bennett
wrote:

Hi Folks,

Finally sunk some cash into one of these things. Thought people might
be interested to learn exactly what they get with one of these.
Feedback is always welcome!

The review:

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlitevssb.htm

Question for you. You say putting the dial indicator at an angle to
get a reading near the table introduces error. It would seem to me
that we don't care about absolute values and the plane from which we
chose to measure is arbitrary. You may not get exactly the same
reading, but I don't see how that prevents you from accomplishing the
goal, especially when the angle we're talking about is small.

Btw, I agree with the others about taking the high road. I can see
addressing the FWW article, but if I want to compare two products I'll
do it myself. All I had to do was look at the picture of the
competition to know it wasn't worth anything more than a cheap dial
indicator.


-Leuf

On Sep 17, 10:37 am, Leuf wrote:
Question for you. You say putting the dial indicator at an angle to
get a reading near the table introduces error. It would seem to me
that we don't care about absolute values and the plane from which we
chose to measure is arbitrary. You may not get exactly the same
reading, but I don't see how that prevents you from accomplishing the
goal, especially when the angle we're talking about is small.

As a general rule, you want to control error introduced by your
measurement setup so that it is less than the resolution of your
measurement device. That way, the reading you see on the measurement
device truely represents the object you are measuring. Otherwise, you
are forced to adjust the readings based on the bias that the setup
imposes - a very error prone procedure.

Error from tilting the dial indicator is going to correspond to the
cosine of the angle of the tilt:

Reading = actual deviation * cos(tilt)

For small angles it's not too much. One degree will make a 0.005"
reading look like 0.004999". But, tilt that indictor 30 degrees and
the 0.005" deviation will look more like 0.004" (0.004330")

Blade alignment should be to within 0.005" to avoid adverse affects in
the quality of the cut. Tilting the indicator in this situation will
reduce the reading by about a thousandth. So, if you can manage to
align the blade so that the reading shows less than 0.004" error, then
you're OK. But, if you don't take this into account, you could think
that it's aligned to 0.005" when it is really more than 0.005". And,
if you factor in the instability of the reading when using something
like a SuperBar (0.002" - 0.003") then the problem becomes even more
complicated.

It would seem like the blade replacement plate is a good solution to
this problem. It is if you can be absolutely sure that it's flat and
will not introduce error greater than the resolution of your
measurement device. In the review I mention the MasterPlate product.
As I understand it, the stated spec for this product is +/-
0.003" (three times, or 300% greater than the resolution of the dial
indicator). It's obvious that use of this particular instrument is
far worse than tilting the dial indicator. At least with the tilted
indicator, you can anticipate the direction and magnitude of the
error. With the plate, it is not possible to discern if a change in
reading is due to arbor misalignment or variation in the reference
surface.

When it comes to flange runout, the tolerance is very small. You
really don't want anything beyond a thousandth of an inch because it
will end up getting magnified by the diameter of the blade. You might
think that your runout is less than 0.001 (ideal) but in reality it's
more like 0.002 - 0.003 (which is something you would like to get
fixed).

Btw, I agree with the others about taking the high road. I can see
addressing the FWW article, but if I want to compare two products I'll
do it myself.

Take a look at the new version and let me know what you think.

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlite_vs_superbar.htm

All I had to do was look at the picture of the
competition to know it wasn't worth anything more than a cheap dial
indicator.

I certainly wish more magazine editors had your powers of observation!

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

On Mon, 17 Sep 2007 11:47:36 -0700, Ed Bennett
wrote:

On Sep 17, 10:37 am, Leuf wrote:
Question for you. You say putting the dial indicator at an angle to
get a reading near the table introduces error. It would seem to me
that we don't care about absolute values and the plane from which we
chose to measure is arbitrary. You may not get exactly the same
reading, but I don't see how that prevents you from accomplishing the
goal, especially when the angle we're talking about is small.

As a general rule, you want to control error introduced by your
measurement setup so that it is less than the resolution of your
measurement device. That way, the reading you see on the measurement
device truely represents the object you are measuring. Otherwise, you
are forced to adjust the readings based on the bias that the setup
imposes - a very error prone procedure.

Error from tilting the dial indicator is going to correspond to the
cosine of the angle of the tilt:

Reading = actual deviation * cos(tilt)

For small angles it's not too much. One degree will make a 0.005"
reading look like 0.004999". But, tilt that indictor 30 degrees and
the 0.005" deviation will look more like 0.004" (0.004330")

Blade alignment should be to within 0.005" to avoid adverse affects in
the quality of the cut. Tilting the indicator in this situation will
reduce the reading by about a thousandth. So, if you can manage to
align the blade so that the reading shows less than 0.004" error, then
you're OK. But, if you don't take this into account, you could think
that it's aligned to 0.005" when it is really more than 0.005".

Okay, I hadn't crunched the numbers. I went down and looked at my
dial indicator on a stick setup and it looks like mine is a fair bit
closer to the table than with the superbar. I measured about a 20
degree angle at most. It seems to me, purely for aligning the blade,
that keeping in mind you're losing .0005 to .001 by tilting is as
viable as your offset bar.

Btw, I agree with the others about taking the high road. I can see
addressing the FWW article, but if I want to compare two products I'll
do it myself.

Take a look at the new version and let me know what you think.

http://www.ts-aligner.com/tsjrlite_vs_superbar.htm

I think you're spending too much effort to be detailed, it makes it
look like you're trying to find anything wrong when the reality is you
don't need to look hard at all. I think you could make a clearer and
more damning argument by just having a three way comparison between
yours, the superbar, and the dial indicator on a stick method.
Something like this:

http://krtwood.com/compare.html

It needs explanation of what some of the terms on the left column
actually mean and why they are important, but it cuts right to the
heart of the matter.


-Leuf

On Sep 17, 6:24 pm, Leuf wrote:
Okay, I hadn't crunched the numbers. I went down and looked at my
dial indicator on a stick setup and it looks like mine is a fair bit
closer to the table than with the superbar. I measured about a 20
degree angle at most. It seems to me, purely for aligning the blade,
that keeping in mind you're losing .0005 to .001 by tilting is as
viable as your offset bar.

It assumes that the point of contact will be a sphere. Most dial
indicators have a spherical stylus but some have more of the sphere
exposed than others. If you run off the edge of the sphere then all
bets are off.

The dial indicator angle on SuperBar is going to depend on how long
the stylus has been extended. The shorter it is, the steeper the
angle. But, you also gain some stability.

I think you're spending too much effort to be detailed, it makes it
look like you're trying to find anything wrong when the reality is you
don't need to look hard at all.

Well, the purpose of the review is to lay out everything about the
product and try to approximate the buyer's experience. I really
dislike the reviews where someone has already decided for me what they
believe is most important. More often than not, that person doesn't
have the slightest idea of what is important and manages to gloss over
points that can make product desirable or unacceptable. When you show
everything, then the reader can decide for themselves if they like the
product or not. Unfortunately, careful scrutiny can look like a witch
hunt.

I think you could make a clearer and
more damning argument by just having a three way comparison between
yours, the superbar, and the dial indicator on a stick method.
Something like this:

http://krtwood.com/compare.html

It needs explanation of what some of the terms on the left column
actually mean and why they are important, but it cuts right to the
heart of the matter.

Nice chart. It outlines the things that are most important to you.
Many people would not be able to use it to make a decision. You're
right, the terms in the left column would need explanation. By the
time you went to all the trouble to explain what each meant and why it
mattered, taking pictures to illustrate the points, you would be
approaching what I have already done. You would just need to include
things like warranty, case, miter slot mechanism, indicator quality,
etc.

It's important to cover the manufacturer's selling points because
these are things that presumably attracted the buyer in the first
place. If they are real, and have some importance, then the review
needs to confirm this. If they are a bogus pile of bovine fecal
matter, then the review needs to expose them (and the maker for being
deceptive).

So, really what I was interested in was the end part. I didn't make
changes to anything else. The feedback from you (and others) said
that the ending was inappropriate. I changed it considerably (taking
a "higher" road) and was wondering what people thought of it.

Thanks,
Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

In article . com,
Ed Bennett wrote:
Hi Folks,

Finally sunk some cash into one of these things. Thought people might
be interested to learn exactly what they get with one of these.

Saw Woodsmith just did a review on three different tablesaw alignment
jigs. All they tested was tablesaw alignment, though, and they didn't
go through the pros / cons of each. Was an unbiased review, though.

Just another $0.02
--
-Steve in Banks, OR
http://woodworking.bigelowsite.com

"Ed Bennett" wrote in message
ps.com...
So, really what I was interested in was the end part. I didn't make
changes to anything else. The feedback from you (and others) said
that the ending was inappropriate. I changed it considerably (taking
a "higher" road) and was wondering what people thought of it.

Much better.

-Jack
http://zo-d.com/stuff

In article . com,
Ed Bennett wrote:
On Sep 17, 10:37 am, Leuf wrote:
Question for you. You say putting the dial indicator at an angle to
get a reading near the table introduces error. It would seem to me
that we don't care about absolute values and the plane from which we
chose to measure is arbitrary. You may not get exactly the same
reading, but I don't see how that prevents you from accomplishing the
goal, especially when the angle we're talking about is small.

As a general rule, you want to control error introduced by your
measurement setup so that it is less than the resolution of your
measurement device. That way, the reading you see on the measurement
device truely represents the object you are measuring. Otherwise, you
are forced to adjust the readings based on the bias that the setup
imposes - a very error prone procedure.

Error from tilting the dial indicator is going to correspond to the
cosine of the angle of the tilt:

Reading = actual deviation * cos(tilt)

Ed, I agree that the tilt alters the reading you get on the dial indicator.
I also agree with your statement about the tip being spherical and getting
off the the sphere causes all bets to be off.

However, I think you're incorrect about the error you get by having the
dial indicator tilted. What happens is the actual error displayed is
*increased*, not decreased.

The correct formula is:

Reading = actual deviation / cos(tilt)

On Sep 18, 3:01 pm, (Stephen Bigelow)
wrote:

Saw Woodsmith just did a review on three different tablesaw alignment
jigs. All they tested was tablesaw alignment, though, and they didn't
go through the pros / cons of each. Was an unbiased review, though.

Just another $0.02
--
-Steve in Banks, ORhttp://woodworking.bigelowsite.com

Hi Steve,

It wasn't a bad article...per se.

Woodsmith gives the impression of an unbiased magazine because they
don't take any advertising - as least no "outside" advertising. See p.
51 of the same issue. They sell two of the jigs in their store. The
third jig (the one they peeled the product label off of) is in a
completely different class than the others (which is why it costs more
than the other two combined). From the article, it would seem that
"...all three jigs work in the same way." and "...each of these jigs
does more or less the same thing...". This is rather misleading
information. One of the three jigs does many more things on many more
machines than the other two. See my comments previously post in this
thread:

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.w...42d919f649912d

Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

On Sep 18, 3:14 pm, "Jack Dahlgren" wrote:

Much better.

-Jackhttp://zo-d.com/stuff

Thanks Jack! I appreciate the feedback.

Ed

On Sep 18, 4:20 pm, (John Cochran) wrote:
Ed, I agree that the tilt alters the reading you get on the dial indicator.
I also agree with your statement about the tip being spherical and getting
off the the sphere causes all bets to be off.

However, I think you're incorrect about the error you get by having the
dial indicator tilted. What happens is the actual error displayed is
*increased*, not decreased.

The correct formula is:

Reading = actual deviation / cos(tilt)

Hi John,

That's funny, I remember it being an error factor, not an error
quotient. I don't have my books here at the shop but I found this on
the web:

http://www.mmsonline.com/articles/1003gage.html

He seems to think it's a factor too. Hmmm...

So, I rigged up a 0.0001/div indicator to see what happens. I tilted
it down 30 degrees relative to the table. This makes it 30 degrees
off axis with a line perpendicular to the surface of the blade. I
used a cone indicator point with an 80 degree included angle to avoid
interference from edges. Then I used two gage blocks (0.1000 and
0.1050) against a 2,3,4 block to check the difference in reading. If
there were no error, then you would expect the indicator to show a
0.005" change. Instead, it showed a 0.0058" change. The error did
make the reading larger, just like your formula would predict. It's
off by a little but then I didn't do anything to ensure alignment in
the other direction).

The emperical data does support your formula. And, as I think about
the geometry, it seems to make sense. Hmmmm.....

Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

On Sep 18, 4:20 pm, (John Cochran) wrote:

Ed, I agree that the tilt alters the reading you get on the dial indicator.
I also agree with your statement about the tip being spherical and getting
off the the sphere causes all bets to be off.

However, I think you're incorrect about the error you get by having the
dial indicator tilted. What happens is the actual error displayed is
*increased*, not decreased.

The correct formula is:

Reading = actual deviation / cos(tilt)

Hi John,

Are you sure? I don't have my books here at the shop but I found this
on the web:

http://www.mmsonline.com/articles/1003gage.html

This guy is saying it's an error factor, not a quotient.

You've got my curiosity going. I jiged up an indicator to see what
happens and the reading was higher than expected. For a 0.005"
change, the reading is 0.0059". That's pretty close to the calculated
0.005773, considering I didn't do anything to align the indicator in
the other direction.

I tilted the indicator down so that it formed a 30 degree angle with
the table surface. This would be the same as being 30 degrees off
axis with a line perpendicular to the blade. Then I measured two
gauge blocks (0.1000 and 0.1050) proped vertically against a 2,3,4
block (standing in for the blade). I used a cone shaped indicator
point (80 deg included angle) to ensure that no edges were going to
interfere with the measurement.

I'll check the books when I get home tonight. The emperical data does
support your formula.

Ed Bennett


http://www.ts-aligner.com
Home of the TS-Aligner

In article .com,
Ed Bennett wrote:
On Sep 18, 4:20 pm, (John Cochran) wrote:

Ed, I agree that the tilt alters the reading you get on the dial indicator.
I also agree with your statement about the tip being spherical and getting
off the the sphere causes all bets to be off.

However, I think you're incorrect about the error you get by having the
dial indicator tilted. What happens is the actual error displayed is
*increased*, not decreased.

The correct formula is:

Reading = actual deviation / cos(tilt)

Hi John,

Are you sure? I don't have my books here at the shop but I found this
on the web:

http://www.mmsonline.com/articles/1003gage.html

This guy is saying it's an error factor, not a quotient.

You've got my curiosity going. I jiged up an indicator to see what
happens and the reading was higher than expected. For a 0.005"
change, the reading is 0.0059". That's pretty close to the calculated
0.005773, considering I didn't do anything to align the indicator in
the other direction.
If you were off as little as 2 degrees in the other direction, the
error angle would be close enough to 32 degrees to account for your
reading. And frankly, 2 degrees is pretty darn close considering that you
most likely only have about an inch or two distance.

I came up with my formula by looking at the geometry of the situation.
Just looking at a right triangle, what you're attempting to measure
is the change in length of side B. However, what you're actually measuring
is the change in length of hypotenuse C. For a tilt angle of 0 degrees,
you run into the happy situation of both lengths being the same. However,
for any other tilt angle, the hypotenuse will always increase in length
faster than the side.

B
a ..............................
...... c.
...... . A
...... .
C ...... .
...
b

Now I agree that you always want to have a tilt angle as close to zero as
possible. Not only does it give you a better absolute reading on the error,
but I suspect that many dial gauges don't like having lateral loads on
their spindles and in fact may have a fair amount of "wiggle" in their
spindles when a lateral load is applied to them which would tend to make
determining the exact tilt angle rather hard to calculate, predict, or
measure.

On Sep 19, 2:39 pm, (John Cochran) wrote:
If you were off as little as 2 degrees in the other direction, the
error angle would be close enough to 32 degrees to account for your
reading. And frankly, 2 degrees is pretty darn close considering that you
most likely only have about an inch or two distance.

Yep. It's not an elaborate setup (mag base, 2,3,4 block, calibrated
eyeball, etc.). The result is close enough to say that it verifies
your formula.

I came up with my formula by looking at the geometry of the situation.
Just looking at a right triangle, what you're attempting to measure
is the change in length of side B. However, what you're actually measuring
is the change in length of hypotenuse C. For a tilt angle of 0 degrees,
you run into the happy situation of both lengths being the same. However,
for any other tilt angle, the hypotenuse will always increase in length
faster than the side.

Good analysis. It's what I was thinking too. For the most part, this
is the sort of situation that you read about but never actually
experience. Most people don't deliberately tilt the dial indicator
off axis with the object being measured. In all my years I've never
had the occasion to do it. There's always some way to resolve the
issue so that the readings represent the actual geometry.

Now I agree that you always want to have a tilt angle as close to zero as
possible. Not only does it give you a better absolute reading on the error,
but I suspect that many dial gauges don't like having lateral loads on
their spindles and in fact may have a fair amount of "wiggle" in their
spindles when a lateral load is applied to them which would tend to make
determining the exact tilt angle rather hard to calculate, predict, or
measure.

Yep, you're absolutely right. Using the Offset Bar on the TS-Aligner
products solves the reading problem but it does not avoid the lateral
forces on the plunger. Some indicators have more "wiggle" than others
but for the most part this isn't an issue. There is also increased
friction in the movement which reduces sensitivity, but with
sufficient pre-load this isn't an issue either.

Some might think that this setup magnifies the reading, making it
easier to eliminate small alignment error. Well, not only is the
error magnified, but any instability is too. And, blade alignment
isn't the only procedure which benefits from having the stylus close
to the table surface. Using a square or angle blocks to set the miter
gauge benefits greatly as well.

In order of overall perference, I would have to say that using a blade
replacement plate is the least desireable solution to the problem.
You are far better off doing the alignment over the shorter distance,
tilting the indicator, or (my favorite) using an Offset Bar. Marking
a spot on the blade and rotating the blade so that all your
measurements are with the stylus tip on that spot will always be more
accurate, much more convenient (no need to swap out the blade), and
much less expensive (just get a $0.49 sharpie).

Ed Bennett


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