Rich,

What does that coin say after in God we trust, ALL OTHERS PAY CASH.

Phil

Rich
That is some very impressive work you are doing there. I am amazed that you can do all precision measuring with just a plain old ruler!
Imagine what you do if your smoothstepper was working properly!

cv580

CV580,
The ruler is just for comparison. Actual dimensions were taken with a Gaertner Toolmakers Microscope.
When i get lazy i use the fical micrometer with it.

 I can also do the same engraving with the SS and a realy poopy PC at faster feedrates.  
 In fact, SS + XBOX360 + COPYCAT = CATSMEOO......... at times.

Where's the little lettering ya talked about? I am interested in doing some at under 0.010" high.

RICH

I just read through this post and it remindes me of a control for a machinemI built.
 The customer wanted this thing to have 2 micron accuracy.For the process and machine
I knew that this was a joke but what the heck.I bought some linear guides and servo/controls
and put it all together (2 guides and servos 25k$ usd.).Now this thing had a dro that the operator could look at to monitor the operation.I had a call a few weeks after it was all up and running.Seems that every time some one walked by the indicated value on the dro would bounce around.All kinds of crap started to fly.My solution ;
I had some one put black tape over the last 2 digits on the dro.Now the error was gone and the machine worked great.The process in reality was only measured with a .001" micrometer .
 2 microns is about .00008 in.

Rich
You are the only guy here making noise about engraving .010" high letters. Looking forward to seeing a pic of them when you figure out how to engrave them with your smoothstepper.
Will they be 3D?

cv580

  The SS is not the problem. The combination of spindle and cutter runout along with depth of cut makes
the individual cut lines run together such that there is no longer any space between them. Since the color
is lost ( visual spacing) you no longer have a legable letter. So the mechanical system  becomes the limiting
factor and not the ability of the software and hardware.

If some fraction of a silly .0001" was added to or removed from a cut you would not see it. Which brings us
 back to what we have been trying to say all along.

Now to see say 0.000100" you need to look at it under a lot of magnification. If you had a known optical
standard to compare to, ( yes i have one that goes to .000020" ) , took the time to calibrate a 1000x microscope in a controlled enviroment, along with proper lighting etc, then you can monitor the actual or non step  mechanical movements to sent pulse for fractions of the silly .0001" inches. But in your case, why do all that since your resolution that you have for a step is .0001" and frankly, depending on your stepper motor the micro step won't exactly position in the electric field for that pulse. Of course you can try a different motor and would find out that they are not all created equaly and thus would find differences.

Let not the heart be troubled due to an emotional issue of display.

RICH