Shopsmith Forums

I recently did a teardown & reassembly on my 1985 510 and wanted to figure out how close the speed control is to the actual speed.

Posts in this forum have indicated that a handheld optical tach has been used to measure the speed, but then I got to thinking that wouldn't it be nice to have a permanent readout using an inductive tachometer. Has anyone ever tried this?

Thx,
Eric in Philly

In this thread about a 10ER with a 12V variable speed motor it looks like Charger1966 is using something like an automotive tach mounted on the machine for continuous monitoring.

Thanks Ed - I will follow up with Charger1966.

Different options out there, but if you want more of a canned solution that is already put together, you may find this website interesting:

http://www.mkctools.com/tachoptions.htm

If you have an Arduino, there's a very easy and under $15 solution:

https://maker.pro/arduino/tutorial/how- ... th-arduino

Cool.
I just started learning Arduino so maybe I'll explore this.

Awesome ! If you need pointers, please let me know. I set this up and works fairly accurately.

I might play around with the Arduino approach. I want something more of a stand alone tach and was thinking about something that could pick up a reflected light instead of a magnet so anything could be tested with just a little stick on foil dot. The circuit is simple enough either way. I wonder how light weight the magnet could be to trigger those Hall Effect sensors at high speed. If it was light enough it could be stuck on just like a reflective dot.

The question not (yet) asked is why?

JPG wrote: ↑Wed Feb 17, 2021 2:08 pm The question not (yet) asked is why?

I think he wants to figure out how close the speed control is to the actual speed.

epodietz wrote: ↑Tue Feb 16, 2021 8:53 am I recently did a teardown & reassembly on my 1985 510 and wanted to figure out how close the speed control is to the actual speed.

I want a tachometer because I don't have one. That's a good reason to acquire any tool.