Measure with micrometer.
Mark with chalk.
Cut with hacksaw.
File to fit.

oddjob uno,

Where is C 604 RE, 6" scale made? I've always liked the end graduations on Starrett scales. But, from my buddy's China calipers, I'm wondering if it is China, too. No Athol, Mass like on the old ones.

Our shop is a maintenance machine shop, not an aerospace shop. We work in tenths when fitting bearings. We have no calibration program. We have no gage blocks. We use standards to check our OD mikes, and upon changing the rods in my inside mikes, I check with OD mikes.
We keep no 72 DEG, but we have HVAC.

My calipers are Browne & Sharp, along with most of my mikes because I like their feel. I got Starrett 12" digital calipers, because of danger of chips getting into the long rack. Starrett always seemed tighter, that's why my inside mikes are Starrett. My pin vises are a mixture of Starrett and General. My small hole gages, fishtail, & a couple of pitch gages are Starrett. I don't have a Starrett indicator, I have a Compac, a PEC backplunger (wanted a Starrett 96 but didn't have the money at the time), and a coulple of cheap foreign ones for bad environments & beating and bang in straightening, etc.

I use a Starrett tape measure, Exact torpedo level for pipe & conduit, a 98 for more precision, and mounted an Exact bullseye level on a magnetic mount I made for rough settings when reconditioning castings. A few Starrett are in my pin punches. I use Starrett hole saws on my home projects.

As you see, I wasn't stuck on Starrett for the name or blind loyality. I got what I got for features, durability, and accuracy.

After my buddy having the problem with his calipers, what is next to be made in China? Maybe my scale that I paid the Mass, USA price for. That is why, I'm through with Starrett. I can already see coming the hole saws that shatter, mikes that the carbide faces fall off of, levels with loose vials, and tape measures that the tip breaks off of.

Since you seem connected with Starrett, please pass this on. I hate to see a good American company go to s***.

1st and foremost to answer drews question. i actually still have friends FROM ATHOL,MASS who are natives and 3rd generation employess of l.s. starrett.


each and every mfg over the years has manufactured a "homeowner"/"contractor"/"professional" version of their tools. ANY TOOLS!


it doesnt matter what it is. why? to grab all aspects of the market if possible.


call the low end crap a "loss leader" if you will. and obviously made OFFSHORE.


now if i was in an aerospace CNC machine shop, it would be MANDATORY to have what that shop/company/corp WANTS! it doesnt matter if its japanese or american or german.

ITS WHAT THEY WANT CUZ THEY SIGN YER CHECK!

upon entering such facility even BEFORE YOU TOUCH A PART..................it(yer precision tools) would go to calibration for OBVIOUS REASONS!


now lets say you drop yer precision tool and the measurement is OFF!


and lets say you check 150 parts per yer shift. and the measurement is WRONG!


then lets say the part goes to a secondary process, and the next guy looks at blueprints and does his process to the part on his next shift.


see where i am going with this? the part could actually be machined multiple times WRONG because of that 1st measurement YOU MADE!

now do ya see the costs involved and the REWORK!


but hey SAMMY-G-G knew that because he owns that shop in the picture shown. OR DOES HE? appears sammy g-g's shop does VALVES! as thats the only part evident in picture. i dont see any curvic couplers, hot rotating turbine engine parts, combustors,nacelles, or anything associated with AEROSPACE and TIGHT TOLERANCES!

and he mentioned the BP factory across the street, well unless BP(british petroleum) has gotten into aerospace and i havent heard about it, than BP does underwater drilling for oil. oil flows thru those valves. and we made LOTS of valves at BAKER PUMPS in downtown L.A.. right down the tracks from the L.A. COUNTY JAIL! a lovely area by the way that i spent lots of time at machining stone age valves out of stainless. not mar m/not stellite/not inconel/not waspalloy/ hastelloy/etc etc aka aerospace alloys with high nickel content and extreme RH(rockwell hardness)

i doubt sammy g-g has ever used WHISKA material and machined iconel.


but to question sammy g-g's INFINITE WHIZ-DUMB and the difference btwn what goes up in the air or SPACE...........................heres a lilttle common sense for sammy g-g's BOSS after his more than BRILLIANT STATEMENT and QUESTIONING what i did for the vast majority of my life.


0.002mm=0.000078" OR 78 millionths


so YES starrett tools CAN MEASURE that dimension.

and believe it or NOT any all mfg's of precision tooling have CUSTOM TOOLING SHOPS. so ANYTHING CAN BE MEASURED PRECISELY!

i have no problem with japanese precision tools, i have some. but the vast majority of shops that stayed in biz during the aerospace crunch in 1997(when i split) were JUDGED on their parts performance/delivery/lack of rework and rejection #'s. and there was a hell of alot of machine hops that went belly up. here in phx garrett cut their local vendors DOWN from 219 vendors to like 17 approved vendors. thats a hell of alot of biz space CNC's and everything else involved that went POOF! why cuz they tried to cut corners. snap on or starrett. if yer using it everyday and yer AZZ is on the line, you dont have TIME for problems. and TIME IS ALL YA GOTS! TIME =MONEY!

so YES sammy G-G YOU TOO CAN MEASURE HIGHER TOLERANCES WITH MM graduated precison tooling.

Hmm, I'm not sure I'd consider that measuring millionths.

Sure, you could say 0.002mm=0.00007874015748 inch
But I wouldn't say I just measured billionths or trillionths just because I carried the decimal places out farther, especially when you consider that you're jumping about 39.5 millionths per .001mm increment, or 19.75 millionths if you were looking at .0005mm increments.

What's the scale of the gauge measure and the accuracy, .002mm, .001mm or .0005mm increments?

I'm sure that your knowledge in this area far outstrips mine, but calling that measuring in the millionths seems like a bit of an exaggeration or at least misrepresentation.

A little google search found the data below.

I don't know which gauge you were talking about but the Starrett 795 and 796 micrometers show

• Resolution: .00005" (0.001mm)
• Accuracy: ±.0001" (±.002mm)

That's not millionths.

Finally made it into the stock room and had a look at the Starrett stuff that we have that is waiting for the apprentices to break....
The new Starrett dial calipers and vernier calipers were both made in china as were the metric 0-25 mm micrometers.
All the inch micrometers from 0-1 up to 3-4" were still made in the USA.
Not measuring to the millionth, but we do take it to the ten thousandth of an inch.
Because most of our equipment is manufactured in the States, we still measure in the imperial system.

sammy g-g's INFINITE WHIZ-DUMB seems to be mostly based on cartoons.

Well, it kind of is.

.002mm is 7.8 one hundred thousandths. AKA 78 millionths, or 780 ten millionths.

But it all rounds to one ten thousandth for humans.

What kinda mics does odd job have that we don't know about.

Change to metric and most of your problems will be solved.

DING DING DING DING! THE WINNER! VERY GOOD! YOU GET AN "A++++++++" FOR EFFORT!

unlike our very own "sammy gee-gee" who could not figure this out!


but then hey WTF...............this is PPOT where damn near EVERYONE KNOWS MORE THAN THE OTHER ABOUT EVERYTHANG!

Dimensions given in inches, MMs or cubits are all the same. Just the nomenclature is different.

I worked in dimensional inspection for 30 odd years and you have problems convincing me otherwise. A bunch of decimal points mean little since few parts are toleranced at less than +/- .001. Those that are are largely made and checked under environmentally controlled conditions.....and the engineer that hang that number on something better be able to justify it....or his azz in grass.

Ever a RCH is about .004-.005 thick, bout a tenth of a MM.....dunno bout cubits but I suspect lots of decimal points.

Having done the job in real life, I have found that an operator is more important than a tool.