Great Stocking Stuffer

[Larry Andrews]

http://www.woodcraft.com/product.aspx?P ... 4&hp9=true

Just got one. Works great - small, mag base, reads to a tenth and dirt cheap compared to anything comparable that I know of.

Any other fun ideas?

[Eric Clements]

Make sure your table is level...

[Mako Koiwai]

Let us know how it works as a Camber Gauge ... against a straight edge/tire :ibrightdea:

[Steve Collins]

Is it really repeatable to 0.1 deg?

In other words, if you set it on something solid and take multiple readings, are they all within +-0.1 of each other, e.g.

0.3
0.4
0.3
0.4
0.3


or does the reading jump around more than that:

0.3
0.0
0.5
0.2
0.6
0.4

If it's really accurate to 0.1 deg, I'm going to buy one to use on the Mars rover.

steve

[Eric Clements]

If it's really accurate to 0.1 deg, I'm going to buy one to use on the Mars rover.

Just watch out for the shipping costs!

[Larry Andrews]

Is it really repeatable to 0.1 deg?

It's pretty close to the first distribution. One to two tenths seems like a reasonable tolerance. Because it's small, it is quite sensitive to surface variation - which can be both a good thing and a bad thing depending on what you're trying to use it for. My place has plaster walls and it easily finds the ripples in the surface that I can't see but my hand can feel.

I did trim a tiny sliver off the rubber surround with an X-acto that caused a barely perceptible wobble so now it sits stably on the extruded case. There's a bit more rubber going past the two sides that still needs to be trimmed - all of 30 seconds work.

Just spent time zeroing it on a VPI turntable that I'd carefully leveled with a bullseye. It repeatably finds zero when I put it back on the platter. I haven't done a real gage R&R with it to determine the full accuracy of the MEMS gyro.

Steve - if you work with the Rover, please do me a favor and say hi to Gerke for me. Sadly, I'm going to miss their xmas party tonight.

Eric - LOLsers That was pretty funny - didn't see that one coming.

Mako - that's exactly what I had in mind when I bought it...am guessing that I'll need to use it kart-style and not worry about exact numbers and just compare relative measurements to track data but I suppose that it's possible that I'll find a way to get direct camber measurements.

Anybody want to buy an Intercomp camber gauge?

[Steve Collins]

Wow. Pretty impressive if it's repeatable to something like +0.2 deg for $30. I would guess that it's probably a pair of accelerometers rather than a gyro. The description implies that there is a button to "zero" it, so (once you have used it to verify that it's own case is square) I think you should be able to use it to measure the sum of the camber on both sides of the car. This should work even if the ground is not level (but won't give you information about whether the camber on both sides of the car is equal.)

Not sure I know your pal but it's a big place. Does he work on MER or MSL?
steve

[Larry Andrews]

Dono about the sensor - have heard that ring gyros are down to a few bucks now so I just assumed that's what they used. (I'm also a bit biased as I worked on one of those parts some time ago) Pair of accelerometers makes perfect sense too and is probably a cleaner design.

Everybody I know at JPL is in chip packaging and/or reliability. Birds of a feather... Have no idea what projects they're on.

[Will Kalman]

have heard that ring gyros are down to a few bucks now ....

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