How to spot fake Mitutoyo calipers

[beanflying]

Sorry to say but the few pairs of Stainless Calipers cheapies I have had so far are all still fairly magnetic. So likely they are made from 400 series stainless rather than 300 which is much less of an issue.

Just a couple of ND magnets on them for an idea. I can still slide one between the jaws for a measurement but they then need to be demagnetised after or they become a PITA for general use.

[wraper]

I have fake 150mm Mitutoyo calipers. They worked really well for about three years during which time I never knew they were fake; bought from Amazon first party, not suspiciously cheap, worked smoothly and seemed accurate. As it was my first calipers I should have known that they should turn off automatically and these did not.

It's actually confusing watching that video. By some measures mine appear genuine (case details, paperwork quality, battery supplied, battery compartment, printing), on others it matches the fakes (depth rod mill, no dashes on battery insert, recessed origin button). I think it is possibly just a superior fake compared to what's out there now.

Now I have 300mm "Neiko" calipers. Just as smooth, not pretending to be anything else, turn off automatically. Almost certainly the same as the Shars calipers as mentioned in the video.

IMHO you probably blame genuine calipers. Origin button is almost flush with plastic around it at least on some of genuine calipers, like 0.1-0.2mm above plastic. Channel mill for genuine calipers had two different types in the video, depends on model. The main difference from fakes was milling quality.

no dashes on battery insert

This is the only thing that is suspicious. Which model it is? Do they automatically set to zero in any position calipers were left before reinserting the battery? Also if you remove the battery while calipers are OFF, you will need to wait for at least a few seconds before reinserting the battery to see dashes. I would certainly measure current consumption since all fakes have much higher than genuine.

[aeberbach]

I think they have to be fake. Model number is 500-196-20.

- mill around inside of jaw is not as rounded as real ones.
- origin button recessed a long way
- not enough digits shown in inch range
- tension adjustment holes line up badly
- alignment of yellow swoosh above "ABSOLUTE"
- darker back label printing
- never display dashes
- zero display on battery insert with calipers in open position

But they do have the more complex battery contacts. So possibly a rare "transitional" fake before they realised they could be made cheaper and still sell

https://imgur.com/gallery/ZOIFEaC

[totalnoob]

Not sure from your photos that it is fake. When I get into my shop tonight, I'll look. I have an older (bought in the late '90's) authentic Mitutoyo that looks similar to yours. It has the two battery contacts you show, one of mine broke off recently and I thought I'd have to replace them, finally, but its still working. The Origin button looks to be similarly recessed, I want to say it's in the wrong location on yours, but I could be wrong.  I know mine is genuine because I bought it either from MSC or Travers, directly off of their site back then and I do not believe they would sell fakes as genuine, at least not on purpose. I saw C42's video and his checks really only apply to newer Mitutoyo's, older, genuine, ones may not pass his test, but that does not mean they are fakes, its just that Mitutoyo changed their design over the years. I hate the extremely recessed Origin, I can't tell you how many times I thought I pressed it enough only to find out the caliper did not zero out. I like that the newer ones have that button the same as the other buttons. But then, perhaps they copied an older Mitu design.

I do agree with C42, though, if I were to replace my Mitu, it'd be with a mid-level brand, like the Shars, that don't pretend to be something they are not. I understand that the fakes probably are not bad all by themselves (I have a few of the $10 Harbor Freights that are pretty good, just not as nice of fit and finish as the Mitu, even then they don't pretend to be something they're not), but to portray yourself as something your not, is not what I want to support.

[beanflying]

Milling on the slot and misalignment on the adjustment screws to the outer plastic case sort of increases the likelihood of a fake set. Add to that the shorter swoop over the Absolute and you are there I guess. The full line of dashes on new battery install also seems to be common even with the older 'real' ones.

Backside of my new/old Mitutoyo's now they are on the bench. Very smooth in the action and very well machined and all edges all properly broken unlike the cheap ones.

Re the magnetics of them about the same as my cheapies so no gain to be had there.

[wraper]

I think they have to be fake. Model number is 500-196-20.

- mill around inside of jaw is not as rounded as real ones.
- origin button recessed a long way
- not enough digits shown in inch range
- tension adjustment holes line up badly
- alignment of yellow swoosh above "ABSOLUTE"
- darker back label printing
- never display dashes
- zero display on battery insert with calipers in open position

But they do have the more complex battery contacts. So possibly a rare "transitional" fake before they realised they could be made cheaper and still sell

https://imgur.com/gallery/ZOIFEaC

Yeah, certainly fake as there is no last digit in inch mode to satisfy resolution spec.

[totalnoob]

Agreed. But the Origin button is in the correct place for a copy of an older Mitu. I confirmed with mine last night, it is located in that same area. But with a real Mitu, you get 4 decimal places. Even my HF cheapies you get 4 decimal places.

[HighVoltage]

I ordered a cheap China made stainless steel caliper.
Let's see how good that one is.
Probably good enough to measure magnets to 1/10 of a mm

beanflying was right!

This cheap China made stainless steel caliper is magnetic like my normal Mitutoyo calipers.
- In addition, it is not de-burred and has sharp edges everywhere
- The installed battery is empty and leaked
- It feels like junk.

Well, I wasted Euro 7,99
 

But .... the plastic case is better than the original Mitutoyo cases!
So, to feel better, I bought an nice case, 

[beanflying]

The hinges on my cheapy Caliper case broke so lucky I own a Laser Cutter 

This is my drafting/modeling kit so radius, thread and feeler gauges as well.

[HighVoltage]

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[Muttley Snickers]

I had posted these in an older thread but the attached Mitutoyo Imitation Leaftet PDF file was no good so here it is again.   

 

[beanflying]

And apart from the battery life, rougher finish the cheaper ones will be just fine for most is the reality

The issue for me is more WTF try or are they 'allowed to' pass off what are fairly obvious fakes even if you just take the provenance of the seller or location. Evilbay is complicit in this locally at least as there is no obvious way a potential purchaser can report the fake before a sale or have that followed by a bunfight over who is right after.

Just playing with my new set of Toy Blocks and cleaning the preservative off, they are also a cheap and cheerful set but based on a quick check under 1/1000 between them on all dimensions and seem parallel face to face. I will put them on the surface plate and dial indicator tomorrow and compare them to some gauge blocks and see how close they really are. Gauge blocks are Grade0 and I have a 0.001mm DTI to avoid the man with two clocks issues 'for now' 

[thm_w]

Was looking at dial indicators, found all of the fakes in one place here: https://www.aliexpress.com/store/1100155041

[tooki]

They also lose count on rapid movement.

I cannot emphasize enough how bad this is, if you get one that suffers from this. And “rapid” isn’t all that rapid, mind you.

I’ve had to redo entire series of measurements and calculations due to this happening on cheap digital calipers (bought at Aldi, look just like one of the cheapies in a photo above). It’d skip in jumps of 0.1” and 0.2” (even in mm mode, so jumps of 2.54 and 5.08mm). I ended up having to verify every measurement against the analog scale to make sure it didn’t skip counts. Extraordinarily time consuming.

The battery consumption was also ridiculous. Multiple LR44 batteries per year.

I replaced it with a Mitutoyo vernier caliper, but I am planning to get a digital one, either a Mitutoyo, Mahr, or Sylvac.

[thm_w]

That's one of the tests I do to check the battery, rapidly slide it back and forth then close to make sure it still zeros out.
I've never had any cheap/decent brands skip with a good battery. But I'm sure some terrible ones exist.

The whole processor probably slows down as the battery dies, as the refresh rate of the LCD gets visually worse.

Of course with either of those three quality brands you'll never have to bother worrying about this.

[james_s]

The thing that impresses me is just how well the genuine stuff manages to work off of a single coin cell. That sort of low power low voltage, especially something with a microcontroller than can function down to less than a volt is an area of engineering I have not done much with.

[KE5FX]

Totally FM, I don't know how they do it either.  My 500-197 will run two or three years on a single SR44... and I never bother to turn it off.

[tooki]

I’m guessing they’re really low-frequency ASICs, similar to the chips in solar calculators, running at a few kHz.