I'm no Luddite but

[John K Jordan]

I often use the camera on my phone to look at something where I can't get my head in the right position to see. ...

I've used my phone to magnify something tiny when I didn't have my old man glasses handy and/or the lighting was poor.

As for the bluetooth calipers, I can see a real value in some settings. I have a quality Mitutoyo digital caliper with an RS-232 port. A manager from Coors Ceramics gave it to me (the data port was flaky on that one). They used them for QC on the production line for data acquisition and analysis to monitor the dimensions of fired ceramic parts for aerospace applications.

JKJ

[David Zaret]

no comment on angle gauges... but, today my friend, commenting on my new Mirka Deros sander, said, "hey, have you downloaded the app for your phone?" i double-blinked at him like he's an idiot. why the heck would i need an app on my phone for my sander?

[johnny means]

There's guys who build cars for track day and there's guys who restore cars to be sculptures. Both are fine hobbies.

[Mark Bolton]

no comment on angle gauges... but, today my friend, commenting on my new Mirka Deros sander, said, "hey, have you downloaded the app for your phone?" i double-blinked at him like he's an idiot. why the heck would i need an app on my phone for my sander?

I hope they dont go the route of john deere et al and make it mandatory and then further hope they dont have an accelerometer in the tool to count how many times if falls off the bench to count against warranty lol. I have a couple really old Cero's sanders that I pray run forever.

[Bert McMahan]

no comment on angle gauges... but, today my friend, commenting on my new Mirka Deros sander, said, "hey, have you downloaded the app for your phone?" i double-blinked at him like he's an idiot. why the heck would i need an app on my phone for my sander?

My new Milwaukee drill and impact driver have an app you can use to set torque and speed profiles. For example, you can open up the app and set the drill to "2 1/5" bimetal hole saw in wood" and it'll adjust the speed for you. Similarly for the impact driver- it can auto detect its own torque output, and have it do things like "spin fast until it senses some torque, then spin slow" for use when installing self-tapping sheetmetal screws. For those, you need to go fast to get it to penetrate, but if it goes too fast in "impact drive" mode you'll strip it out. Most drivers just have a "high or low" mode, which means you either have to be super careful to not strip in High mode or lean into it for a while in Slow mode. Necessary? Not at all. Cool? Absolutely

You can also set it up to have multiple presets. For example (in addition to the manual, standard adjustments) you can have preset 1 be a hole saw, 2 be a small wood screw, 3 to be a 3/16" hole in metal, etc.

I'd suspect a sander could benefit from similar settings regarding speeds, ramp-up time, torque limits, etc. It's probably a good benefit for more assembly line tasks as well- if you really need a slow sanding speed to get a good finish, you could lock the sander at the right speed so nobody tries to bump it up and save some time.

I bet you could also use it to actually compare different grits or brands of sandpaper over time, assuming it tracks hours in use.

Just a guess though, I'm just a hobbyist

[David Zaret]

well, that's interesting - didn't know my sander runs Linux. i guess my general take is that while it's perhaps possible to tune my ROS via an app, i'd prefer to not have to. and, of course, i don't have to (and won't)! i'm all about using technology, in and out of the shop, but man, i could do without an app-controlled sander.

---dz

My new Milwaukee drill and impact driver have an app you can use to set torque and speed profiles. For example, you can open up the app and set the drill to "2 1/5" bimetal hole saw in wood" and it'll adjust the speed for you. Similarly for the impact driver- it can auto detect its own torque output, and have it do things like "spin fast until it senses some torque, then spin slow" for use when installing self-tapping sheetmetal screws. For those, you need to go fast to get it to penetrate, but if it goes too fast in "impact drive" mode you'll strip it out. Most drivers just have a "high or low" mode, which means you either have to be super careful to not strip in High mode or lean into it for a while in Slow mode. Necessary? Not at all. Cool? Absolutely

You can also set it up to have multiple presets. For example (in addition to the manual, standard adjustments) you can have preset 1 be a hole saw, 2 be a small wood screw, 3 to be a 3/16" hole in metal, etc.

I'd suspect a sander could benefit from similar settings regarding speeds, ramp-up time, torque limits, etc. It's probably a good benefit for more assembly line tasks as well- if you really need a slow sanding speed to get a good finish, you could lock the sander at the right speed so nobody tries to bump it up and save some time.

I bet you could also use it to actually compare different grits or brands of sandpaper over time, assuming it tracks hours in use.

Just a guess though, I'm just a hobbyist

[Richard Coers]

I hate digital angle boxes. Some only had 1 decimal place readout. 1/10 of a degree is a ton when doing accurate work.

[Brian W Evans]

This would be useful if you were, say, adjusting the leveling legs of a saw or table or something and had the sensor on the base. You could sit on the floor with your wrench and watch the readout on your phone. If I was buying one I'd pay an extra $10 for a Bluetooth connection option.

Hadn't thought of that! That would make it worth an extra $10 for me.

I have a Bosch laser measure and I love the bluetooth connectivity with my phone for taking measurements without having to write anything down. You can also overlay the measurements on a picture taken with your phone. There are other features as well. Extremely handy.

In general I would say that bluetooth capability is so cheap and data collection so ubiquitous that you might as well include it. If the bluetooth dies, the tool still works anyway.

[Tom M King]

I could use one of those for setting the alignment on the dually. I sometimes tweak it judging by tire wear, and I do use the Wixey gauge for it. It would save so much in and out under the truck. .1 degrees is a plenty for that, and it's relative to what the prior setting was, so it works fine.

[Andrew Seemann]

I'm no Luddite but are we getting carried away with technology in our woodworking ? I just saw an ad for a Wixey digital angle gauge with Bluetooth that talks to you ,and can be controlled by your phone. Do we really need that to measure an angle?
Ok,maybe I'm a Luddite

I tend to be a Luddite as well when it comes to tech (that happens when you do tech for a living, you're ready to be done with it after work), but I totally could remember times when that would have been quite helpful. Not so much for shop stuff, but carpentry things or setting up machinery where I needed to level something out of sight while using two hands (crowbar in one hand, shims in the other that kind of thing).

Actually, I'm kind of glad to have found out about it now. I'm not going to run out and buy one now, but I'm going to keep it in mind for the next time I need to do something like that.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

The only bluetooth connectivity that I've found useful is on the Spectra laser, it lets my phone know if it's been bumped. It told me that the other day when a customers cows were being curious on a job site. One of our crew has that Milwaukee impact driver mentioned above, he wasted a few hours messing with it the first few days he had it, since it's just been a forgotten feature. He challenged my old trusty dumb Dewalt in a driver race with 3" framing screws, which he repeatedly lost regardless of the setting, so I think the novelty wore off quickly.

[Keith Outten]

It's a pretty common practice for a multitude of industries to use tools that were originally designed for another purpose. As Tom mentioned above we often found alternate uses for just about any tool or other material originally designed for just one industry. When I was working refueling outages we were pretty innovative and found some crazy ways to use even the most simple devices to accomplish difficult tasks, most of the time in an effort to reduce radiation exposure. We used copy machines so we could bring drawings out of radiation areas destroying the original that was contaminated. The copy was delivered to a clean area so it could be picked up after we left the radiation area. We used modifyed sand blasting cabinets with freon blasting to decontaminate both hand tools and electrical power tools so they could be safely removed and used or be discarded without the cost of disposal of radioactive materials.

I expect the collective brain power of this Community would be able to come up a thousand ways to use a Wixey blue tooth angle guage that would be impressive. On the surface some features may seem to be of little value to one group and be an amazing feature to another.

[Joe Rogers]

I could use one of those for setting the alignment on the dually. I sometimes tweak it judging by tire wear, and I do use the Wixey gauge for it. It would save so much in and out under the truck. .1 degrees is a plenty for that, and it's relative to what the prior setting was, so it works fine.

Interesting you posted this. The Gen 7 Corvettes have an adjustment requirement for rear camber with a need to maintain the spec rear caster angle.
A jig is required in combination with a digital angle gauge. Adding blue tooth to monitor the angle while making the adjustment would save a bunch of time. In this application, the features would benefit.
Joe

[Jim Becker]

I thought about this a bit, and I can imagine some circumstances where it would actually be helpful to be able to keep one's eyes on what they are adjusting while a bluetooth enabled device "counts down" to where you want it. That avoids splitting attention as well as constant visual refocusing. Is this "necessary"? No. But there's no harm in technology providing additional assistance like this, either.

[ChrisA Edwards]

Looks like the Wixey Angle gauge is the one that offers the Bluetooth capability. There's about a $15-$20 price difference, depending upon where you buy it, between the normal one and the one with the Bluetooth capability.

If I didn't already have the standard one, I'd buy the Bluetooth version if making an initial purchase, but that's just me.