I do the same as you do, if I only need to be approximate.

One caution: The dial on mine is numbered like any other dial, say, 0, 10, 20, 30, and back to zero. I made a dumb mistake once and thought that advancing from 20 to 30 (doing all the things to get rid of backlash) would increase the cut 10 thousanths. It didn't. It increases 20 thous. Of course, there is a label that says 0.002 per division. Also, between #30 and zero, it is not 5 or 10 divisions, it is 6 divisions or 12 thousanths. One full rotation is thus 72 thousanths. That is the type of mistake you only make once. From then on, I counted the actual divisions. John