Jack,
The very same reasons I mounted mine on the front but it also had another advantage. There were two screws in the carriage I was able to use a piece of scrap aluminum as an adaptor plate that also allowed me to raise and lower the reader as needed I then shimmed as needed to center it on the glass scale.
I then drilled and taped the cross-slide for an adaptor plate that that had to be slotted allowing it to move up and down as well for alignment purposes so I could make it run parallel to the carriage. Just pieces of advice, if you have a cold and are sneezing, don’t tap hard steel.
I jerked the tap as it happened and broke it off in the cross-slide.
Was not worth it to try and get it out so I just drilled a new whole ½” over and noted the modifications for the adaptor plate and waited until I was over my cold.
Now I’m on to make my own collet closer for my ETM ER-40 to mount in my lathe, since it is spring loaded I don’t need a fancy holding system just something that will cinch it into the spindle since it is quick to remove the collets from the locking plate. I will take better pictures next time.
Charles