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printerman
03-28-2012, 10:57 AM
Gonna need some calipers coming up soon and I was hoping for some insight !

When I buy calipers should I get mechanical (non-electric) or electric ?

.....thanks

L1A1Rocker
03-28-2012, 11:49 AM
I read a review many years ago (more than 10) on the different calipers. The eletronic ones were very poor in accuracy and repeatability. The dial calipers all tested equal to the old venier caliper. Based on that review I've never bought an electronic caliper.

imanaknut
03-28-2012, 12:08 PM
Dial all the way, and if you drop it, less chance of hurting it.

circuits
03-29-2012, 12:11 PM
When I buy calipers should I get mechanical (non-electric) or electric ?

Never seen any actual electric calipers. DIGITAL calipers are still mechanical - just include a fancy electric circuit to count revolutions of the mechanical bits and report that on a screen instead of simply moving the hand of a dial.

High quality is more important than readout method. An expensive digital caliper is much more likely to be high quality than an inexpensive digital caliper, but high quality dial calipers are less expensive than even mediocre digital calipers.

Only reason to buy digital is if your eyes are too bad to read a dial.

Partisan1983
03-29-2012, 03:10 PM
My shop switched over to digital calipers and digital micrometers years ago. They are very expensive, but they have been great and so far have been holding up very well.



FWIW

binky59
03-29-2012, 06:24 PM
Gonna need some calipers coming up soon and I was hoping for some insight !

When I buy calipers should I get mechanical (non-electric) or electric ?

.....thanks

Quality is what you want, go with starrett, or even mitutoyo, their dial calipers are
top quality. I have a small set of precision jo blocks to calibrate on.
good luck.

O.S.O.K.
03-29-2012, 09:37 PM
I like my stainless mechanical calipers. They've held up very well to my long time use. I think I got them from Midway USA.