Elephants' feet / tips for dial gauges - supplier?

[Eric The Viking]

There are times when I hate the UK: in the US, via Amazon or eBay you can find suppliers of all sorts of things. Here, you have what you're given, pretty much.

I want an elephant's foot for my el-cheapo dial gauge. In other words a tip for the measurement probe that ends in a flat pad, rather than a point or a ball bearing. I think it's a 1mm or 1.5mm metric thread, male on the tip itself, female on the gauge's shaft.

They're easy to find in the States, with prices from between $6 and $20 for a kit of screw-on tips of all shapes and sizes. Can anyone suggest somewhere here that might do them cheaply? I've tried the usual suspects: Chronos, Tilgear, Axminster: dial gauges themselves seem to be ten-a-penny, but the tips are made of unobtanium, it seems. Weird.

I can't even think about £95 for a Starrett set. It's only for setting my planer knives, so occasional use and for a few minutes at a time - not worth spending lots, and anyway, I don't have lots to spend.

I'm considering making something (soldering a lump of brass onto a bolt, for example), but I'd rather not if I can find something.

... help?

E.

 

[jasonB]

J&L / MSC do the Mitutoyo ones but at about £60 a tip not cheap.

EDIT, bottom of page, a bit more withiong your price range
http://www.arceurotrade.co.uk/Catalogue ... ial-Gauges

J

 

[dickm]

Might almost be cheapest to scour the car boot sales (or ask the amazing bargain bloodhound Jimi to do it for you ) to find a complete dial gauge with attached foot. They seem to be the sort of thing that does go cheap at CB sales, as so few folk want them or even know what they are for.

 

[Eric The Viking]

Thanks both.

These that Jason suggested look ideal: http://www.arceurotrade.co.uk/Catalogue/Measurement/Dial-Gauges, but I'm surprised about the thread used. They're worth a punt as they're so inexpensive, but I may call them first - you'd think Chinese made dial gauges would have metric threads, unless they slavishly copied Starrett, etc.

I got the planer knives set up pretty well in the end - no visible snipe at all. The cutter block on my 439 is too small for the magnetic adjuster things to fit (the tables are alloy castings, not steel or iron, so they don't help either). Much faffing about. In the end I wedged the block against infeed and outfeed tables with small hardwood wedges in the centre, keeping the knife (mostly) at TDC and leaving enough room to spanner the two end clamp bolts. An elephant's foot would have saved much cursing.

The silly thing doesn't have height adjusting grub screws, only a couple of springs. If you cover everything in Liberon machine wax, so it doesn't gum up, that makes the knife stick (the springs aren't very strong). Then you find it's moved off TDC, and the dial gauge is miles out, as the ball bearing on the tip has slipped off back down the bevel of the knife. Back to 1st square...

I hate machinery that isn't designed to be serviced easily.

Thanks again,

E.

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

I went through all this to get a dial gauge capable of setting my planar knives accurately. In the end I tracked down a Canadian brand called the Oneway Multi gauge. Its brilliant in short. The wood whisperer reviews it in one of his videos about planar setup.

It has an elephants foot the type you describe. I tracked down (via Germany) their UK distribution...only one business has them here and its in Oxford. I'll just go dig out the name. Got it...its a company called Toolpost (www.toolpost.co.uk).

They have them in stock. Now I appreciate you might not want to buy the whole thing as they're near a£100. However, they have a thread on the dial gauge with two choices of foot...normal and elephant. I use the elephant one on my planar knives to great effect. It might be they can supply just those feet and not the rest of the kit.

I'd give them a call...worth a try.

Cheers

 

[Eric The Viking]

Thanks Bob.

I knew about those - came across them when I first got the planer (it's been a refurb project for a couple of years, until now). Too pricey for me, but I'm intending something similar, as I have a spare sliding mitre fence for the tablesaw, which has a chunky cast and milled alloy square on it. I'll mount the dial gauge on one flat, and t'other will bear on the outfeed table. It might need a weight, but that's easy.

It won't be as good as the Oneway multi gauge, which is by far the most sensible thing for the job I've yet found, but it will be cheap and fairly accurate. It will get rid of the play in the dial gauge stand I'm presently using, too - a magnetic one is no help, sadly.

I've ordered that tip set and I'll report back when it arrives.

E.