What is the utility of a Dial Indicator and Multi-Position Magnetic Base?

[Uncle Hook]

My local Harbor Freight store has / had a 1" Dial Indicator and a Multi-Position Base with Fine Adjustment on sale - at 50% discount if I recall correctly. So I picked up a set without knowing whether I would find a use for them.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=33675

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...temnumber=5645

I hope someone can help me with the following questions:

Are these 2 items designed to work together?

Are these items useful to have in a home woodworking shop or are they intended for a machine / metal shop use?

What tasks in a home wood shop are they useful for?

Also what are parallell bars used for?

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...Itemnumber=789

[BigguyZ]

The dial indicator and base can be used to test/ setup your WWing machinery. Specifically, the indicator can measure blade runout of your TS.

[linear]

I skipped the base, but I just bought a dial indicator to get a precise measurement on router bit height above the tabletop. I'll be adding a shop made base to it for that purpose. It should work on saw blade height too.

See also: http://www.bt3central.com/showthread.php?t=18006

[LCHIEN]

they are meant to work together but the base is magnetic which means to measure saw and drill press runout and fence parallelism etc you need a steel table.
For saw with an aluminum table (like the forums namesake) you can still use the dial gauge, just use the mounting ear in the back to attach it to a fence jig or something that you can solidly attach to the saw fence or table and you can have aperfectly performing gauge.

[nadz]

if i had enough rods and swivel clamps, i could make sure the earth ran true

yes yes yes

indicators dont make the world go round, but they can tell you if its running true!

limited only by your imagination...use them to see if your SMT runs parallel to your blade, fence, etc...check your fence to your blade, etc...

the mag base is more useful in a machine shop, such for checking travel on a mill or dialing in a part in a 4-jaw lathe chuck...

good purchase tho- you wont regret it...


-a

[Bruce Cohen]

I use a piece of sheet metal double sided taped to the saw top to allow the magnetic base to work with the BT3

Bruce

[Tom Slick]

Also what are parallell bars used for?


they are used as spacers for vises/fixturing in machine shop work. usually a machine vice has 2" tall jaws. if your part is 1/2" tall you'd use a parallel to space it up to the top of the jaws.

[BigguyZ]

Also what are parallell bars used for?


they are used as spacers for vices/fixturing in machine shop work. usually a machine vice has 2" tall jaws. if your part is 1/2" tall you'd use a parallel to space it up to the top of the jaws.

The bars can also be used to check for twist on a surface. However, it would only be small surfaces that you could test on with that particular set...