When thinking of hand-held inspection gages, the first tools that usually come to mind are calipers, micrometers, pin gages, gage blocks, and go/no go gages. These tools have been around for generations and they’re still widely used, even though today’s quality inspectors have access to much more sophisticated inspection equipment.
The reason? Hand-held gages are easily accessible, fast, and easy to use. Many are accurate to .0001, and they don’t consume as much floor space as high tech equipment.
Of course, the downside is that you can typically only measure one dimension at a time with hand gages. If you need to measure the true position of eight pins and ten holes in a gearbox, for example, you’re not going to grab pin gages and calipers.
For a job like that, a more advanced inspection tool, like our Zeiss Coordinate Measuring Machine (CMM), is a more efficient option. But unless the CMM is already programmed to measure that specific gearbox, it’s not the fastest or easiest way.
The most efficient way to inspect the gearbox would be to slide a precision gage onto it that’s capable of measuring the true position of all the pins and holes at once.
Producing gages like this is one of Sirois Tool’s specialties. After more than 60 years of supporting manufacturers, we understand their challenges. We know they are constantly pressured to reduce customers’ costs, so we collaborate with them to develop precision gages that will streamline their processes and minimize inspection time.
We can confidently say that our gages have drastically reduced our customers’ inspection times. We can also share that we manufacture their precision gages to be accurate within .0001, and we manufacture them from hardened Tool Steel, which reduces the need for frequent calibration.
Programming a CMM takes time, and good operators are difficult to find. If your inspectors could perform the same high quality measurements with a hand-held gage in a fraction of the time, wouldn’t it make sense to develop one?
When you’re ready, send us your drawings/models or Contact Us for help.