BALL BAR PROGRAM

[[Jo...]]

Does anyone run a program using Ball bar to check machine volume in between yearly calibrations ? I have a 300mm and 600mm length that is collecting dust. I would like guidance for writing a meaningful program if it is worthwhile.

[[Ri...]]

I don't have any experience with a ball-bar, and I thought that I heard that people have moved away from them as they weren't accurate/meaningful in the data that it gave you.

We purchased a reference length gage (stepper gage) from Starrett that wasn't cheap, and I accidently already damaged (yay... 😱 😱 ) That works well for these things.

Send some pictures, and maybe we can help on something to setup.

[[Ow...]]

Several years ago, I thought about incorporating a 16" ball bar we had from an older LK CMM but, went another route as the argument that the ball-bar wasn't much for linear accuracy but squareness and repeatability.
However, I guess it would be better than nothing.
If nobody comes forward, I'd check with any local, maybe in your state, cmm calibration companies other than Zeiss. Might find somebody on the elsmar or pcdmis forums who use many different types of CMM software's and maybe somebody will have one for Calypso.

Here's a link on the subject of quarterly checks from a few years ago.
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=607&start=10

[[Jo...]]

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I'm aware of the limitations of the ball bar. I also have a quick check artifact like shown in the link. It however is aluminum tubing and seems worthless to me. I wouldn't think it to be stable enough. The challenge with the Ball Bar is it would need to be positioned in multiple orientations to be much value. Ideally it needs to be checked using one stylus and in one program to relate all the results. I don't see a practical way of doing that, especially with alignments. I'm not going to expend much effort for the little return. It was an expenditure that I wish I could use somewhere else, but it was purchased before my time here.