Can we talk about how I used to set my boring bar by eye and now I use a $22 dial indicator

Victor Butler · 2026-10-09T04:05:03.386444+00:00

For the first 6 years on my lathe at the shop in Bakersfield I would set boring bar height by eye, just eyeballing it against the tailstock center. I scraped a run of 40 aluminum bushings back in March because the bar was sitting about .015 low and I never caught it. My lead guy handed me his spare dial indicator and showed me to sweep it off the chuck face, takes me maybe 40 extra seconds per setup now. Bore sizes have been holding within .0005 since I made the switch. Did your shop ever give you a hard time about slowing down your setup for a check like this?

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Can we talk about how I used to set my boring bar by eye and now I use a $22 dial indicator | CNC Operators - Opinions Matter