Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Alexis, NC 28006
Lots of have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Alexis, NC. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to many individuals. There’s only on place to get the at a reasonable cost which’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Opting for a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Naturally, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a bonus. The schedule of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get great quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts been available in a range of designs from the factory. Typically ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very little. Sherline likewise offers WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. The majority of choose ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle go through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, a lot of truly do not care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It provides the most flexibility and lots of tool choices. You can discover lots of reviews on both the lathe and the mill. Popular designs are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The likewise can be found in CNC, manual and CNC ready versions. Just recently, they have added ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Search the web if you want an evaluation or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Alexis.
Taig also offers lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In reality, you can find a great deal of videos and posts referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products offer much more stiff methods and usually more “sturdy” in general. The Taig motors are pretty weak, much like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like a completely various mill or lathe. Taig also offers a good CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also go with their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software application. 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 provide. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The nice thing is that they now use a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both manufactures is the lack of severe upgrades.
Sherline offers lots of parts and attachments, but very little to make it a much better machine. To start with, they headstock uses bad quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This suggests the spindle itself requires to be small. A spindle with very little mass suggests the lathe or mill the finish quality won’t be as good and based on vibration issues. For instance, they provide numerous lathe accessories, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole needs to be small since the bearings are small. There is a comparable problem with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Alexis, North Carolina 28006 may have different needs.
There are other machine choices too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t real good. Lots of end up either really disappointed or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Outstanding upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want to choose a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a lot of the hardware options in the market. You can do stiff tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it uses constant speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the standard for many years. However, they were clunky at finest and really only targeted at amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. Much of which are 5 axis machines. The 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 likewise produce evaluations of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many grumble that the little chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will simply fall out. On option is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter built in. This can open more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Especially if you opt for bigger bearings.