Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Aberdeen, ID 83210
Lots of are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Aberdeen, ID. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to numerous people. There’s only on location to get the at a reasonable cost which’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal for the mill. Going with a 5C is perfect for the lathes. Naturally, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a bonus offer. The availability of tooling for each of these designs is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get great quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a variety of models from the factory. Generally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very little. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for really tiny work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. The majority of prefer ER25, ER32 or perhaps ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle travel through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, many really don’t care for the MT1 and hardly like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It offers one of the most versatility and numerous tool options. You can find many evaluations on both the lathe and the mill. Popular designs are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The also can be found in CNC, manual and CNC all set versions. Just recently, they have added ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the internet if you want a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Aberdeen.
Taig also provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In truth, you can find a lot of videos and posts describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products use far more rigid ways and usually more “strong” in general. The Taig motors are quite weak, much like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine look like an absolutely different mill or lathe. Taig also offers a great CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also select their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the same problems as the Sherline. They are far too little. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they offer. We will do a review of the 5C in the future. The nice thing is that they now offer a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both makes is the lack of major upgrades.
Sherline provides numerous parts and attachments, however very little to make it a better machine. To begin with, they headstock uses poor quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This implies the spindle itself needs to be little. A spindle with extremely little mass means the lathe or mill the surface quality won’t be as great and based on vibration problems. For example, they use many lathe devices, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the go through hole has to be little due to the fact that the bearings are little. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can only utilize ER16 collets and this limits its use. Of course those in Aberdeen, Idaho 83210 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Aberdeen
There are other machine alternatives too. You can also purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t genuine excellent. Many wind up either very disappointed or doing a great deal of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Excellent upgrades are ballscrews, updated brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want to opt for a CNC machine, your best option is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a lot of the hardware alternatives in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it uses consistent speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for several years. However, they were clunky at best and really just focused on amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. Many of which are 5 axis devices. The very best servos to utilize for CNC on the Sherline or Taig are either DMM, Clearpath or GlockCNC brands. Integrate that with the Centroid Acorn and you will have a powerful machine. We will also produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill using the Acorn hardware.
What about a much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Lots of grumble that the little chucks will not hold steel for cutting. The part will just fall out. On alternative is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open up more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you opt for bigger bearings.