Emco DRO install and way cover

I recently purchased an Emco Maximat Super 11, It's in great condition, rarely used but did not have a DRO installed.

So, I bought a set of digital scales and figured I would attach them together with a way cover to try to keep the Lathe in as good a condition as I can.

The Z scale install was relatively straightforward. I attached the reader using the existing bolt at the back of the crop slide, while the scales were mounted with two tapped holes in the casting.

Using another section of the L bracket I spanned over the scale and the cover which came with the slides. The brackets which came with the DRO kit were quite large so i split one in two and was able to use this to bridge the gap.

The X scale was a little trickier.

I had seen Robin Renzetti and Stefan Gotteswinter talk about machine way guarding and about the consideration of placing the X scale on the cutter's side to minimize Abbe error. In essence, keeping the scale as close to the cutter as possible to minimize errors.

These made a lot of sense to me.

I opted to use the back 70 mm of the crop slide t slot to mount the DRO/way cover using an aluminium plate attached to two elongated t slots. This mounting plate will cover the top of the cross-slide ways. This way it moves the compound towards the middle of the cross slide, which has the added benefit that for most of the work I will do on the lathe the cross slide itself covers the bottom part of the cross slide ways.

The scale will be mounted on this Aluminium L bracket i had left over from a previous project, as well as the bed way cover on the outside of the bracket.

Measuring in CAD where I wanted the reader in relation to the t slots i made two spacer blocks which could in turn bolt down the (modified) scale guard that came with the kit. I then drilled and tapped one hole in the side of the cross slide casting and attached another aluminium block to be able to Stainless cover

Once this was done I could get started on the Stainless cover plate, this would ride flush with the top of the cross slide above the stationary scale and scale cover, and be attached at the bottom of the mounting plate and on the mounting block at the end of the cross slide.

Tip: When milling thin steel stock high speeds and small stepdowns are a must, this was done with a 6mm carbide endmill on a wood subplate. RPM 1250 r/min and a stepdown of 0.1 mm per pass.

I did not have enough travel on our FP1 to do everything in one pass, so I prioritized the "mating edges," made sure I could mill those in one pass, then moved my plate up or down and dialled that existing edge in square using a DTI.

Because I had to keep some tabs to hold down the work, I milled the first two passes fully and then left some stock for the tabs. This way, all the edge lines visually looked nice and crisp, and I could file the tabs away to an existing edge.

When i placed the cover on the machine I felt that i had been to liberal with the amount of overhang in relation to the scale guard. Making the side feel out of proportion. So i opted to remount the plate on the mill and remove another 9 mm.

After

Before

seemed like a lot of work for something which did not interfere with the functionality of the machine but im glad i did.

I added 4 tapped holes to mount a steel plate on top of the aluminium plate, this way I can mount my magnetic dti holder here when I need to.

Then in order to install the DRO I turned two spacers to bridge the gap between the stainless plate and the reader- head.

With the steel plate and bed way cover mounted to the side of the L bracket.

The other side of the way covers is screwed into a 3d print with a compliant spring to clamp in between the two bed-ways.

The finishing touch was 3d printing this cover to keep chips out of this area of the T slots.