Hi All, looking to purchase a reliable, reasonably priced dial indicator. I don't expect to use this for any purpose other than setting the timing on my bikes. Anyone buy one recently that they can recommend? I saw this one on ebay but not sure if its the right one. 

ebay.us/2Dw0HG


 

My first dial gauge was £19.00 from Terry Beckett tuning when i was 19 years old. It's a Sealy one with a plunger and adapter. I still have it today. I bought a dial gauge kit from Yambits a while ago three adapters and plungers . The gauge is wildly inaccurate as i have just found out . I replaced it with a Sirrett branded one .Not cheap but made to last and it's accurate .You get what you pay for in most cases however, I would be tempted to put twenty dollars on that and shop at the nearest machine hardware shop or tool dealer. $30.00 and it's coming from Poland. Your piston and rings would cost double that if you burned a hole in the piston through inaccurate measurement.
Just my 2 bobsworth Adguy .

Just be aware that you need a central plug hole motor for those to work. I just mark a nail held vertical in an angled plug hole on my early model bikes. Sorry, not trying to teach you bad habits. I think DT250A was the first central plug hole head.
Dial gauge looks good in the link but you might need to alter--shorten--or find a longer probe whatever you call it. Looking again i guess there's a certain amount of adjustment sliding the gauge up & locking it with the screw. Be super careful not to damage the gauge but bringing the piston up with gauge secured & running out of travel, so leave lock screw loose initially if you're not sure--or just feel things carefully.

Yes, knowing which model you have is helpful.  On older models with angled plug holes you need to pull the head so then it's easy to make something from Harbor Freight or any tool place work pretty good.

Thanks Mark and crew. This particular need is for the CT1 but would like something that will work for the DT250, DT100, LT2 and my future DT400 when I find one near me. Damn, thought I could get something plug and play. I guess if it was easy it wouldn’t be as gratifying. Still, I could use a bit of easy once in a while. 

There is/was a tool made by Central that works in the angled holes most of the time.  I found one on ebay cheap a few years ago.

 

Just another idea. Set it once even if you have to pull the head, then mark the flywheel & you can reference that every time after that. Buy a strobe to, but not always a good idea as things can jump around with less than perfect main bearings & points pivot wear or loose fiber heal. sometimes its better not to know. And then i was strobing a CDI AG100 so about1980 & found it fired twice per revolution, once at bdc, or approx a couple of mm before i guess, like it does a couple before tdc.

I’ve had this from the early 70’s works with every Yamaha I had either spark plug hole or with head off with the stud adapter for a more accurate reading 

ebay.us/2Dw0HG

This is the one I purchased a few months ago and used on a RD350 and a DT400. It seems to work fine. I had to cut it shorter to use it on the RD350 because of the low clearance between the head and the frame. When using on the DT400, I think you will have to remove the exhaust to obtain the clearance like I ran into with the RD (but that was the frame so no removing that ). The DT exhaust was already off so I didn't run into any problems other than now I had to use an adapter from a compression kit to recreate length because when I cut it short for the RD, it was now TOO short for the DT, meaning the dial was topped out before the piston could reach TDC.. Never easy!

FYI - The thin "rod" of the dial that moves up and down (not sure the official name of this) is shorter than it is seen in the picture yet it comes with a threaded extension that enables it to be the length seen in the ebay pic.  

I'm not certain if my modifications to it rendered it less accurate, but I don't see how it would. The (now shortened) adapter is still threaded so its orientation is correct, and it still is held tightly snug secure so the reading doesn't move at all after zeroing it out.  The bikes run fine now so I guess it worked ¯\_ (ツ) _/¯

You're all good, lengthening or shortening changes nothing for your reading. Only thing is if too short when starting from zeroing it--it wont have enough travel to follow the piston down before topping out--if ya call it topping-- or bottoming, running out of downward travel anyway. Hence the side screw adjust to move it in the holder if need to lift it up if its too long, if frame clearance above to do that, or move down if too short in the pin. Start from halfway maybe so there's a bit of give & take when shortening.