Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Bel Alton, MD 20611
Lots of are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Bel Alton, MD. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to many people. There’s only on location to get the at a sensible cost and that’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal 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 accessibility of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get very good quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a variety of designs from the factory. Normally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are really little. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for very small work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Many choose ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle pass through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, many truly do not care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It offers one of the most versatility and many tool options. You can find lots of evaluations on both the lathe and the mill. Popular designs are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The also been available in CNC, manual and CNC prepared versions. Recently, they have included ballscrew variations for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you want a review or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Bel Alton.
Taig also offers lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In truth, you can find a lot of videos and short articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items use far more rigid methods and generally more “heavy duty” overall. The Taig motors are pretty weak, similar to the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like a totally different mill or lathe. Taig also uses a nice CNC prepared mill and lathe. You can also opt for their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the exact same issues as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock model they offer. We will do a review of the 5C in the future. The good thing is that they now offer a ballscrew choice for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both manufactures is the absence of major upgrades.
Sherline offers numerous parts and accessories, but very little to make it a much better machine. To start with, they headstock uses poor quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This implies the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with really little mass suggests the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as good and subject to vibration problems. For example, they offer many 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 little. There is a comparable issue with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Bel Alton, Maryland 20611 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Bel Alton
There are other machine alternatives too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other suppliers that provide Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t real great. Lots of wind up either very dissatisfied or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Excellent upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want to choose a CNC machine, your best option is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far much 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 provides constant speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for several years. Nevertheless, they were cumbersome at finest and actually only targeted at amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. Many of which are 5 axis makers. The very best servos to use for CNC on the Sherline or Taig are either DMM, Clearpath or GlockCNC brand names. 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 using the Acorn hardware.
What about a much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Numerous grumble that the small chucks will not 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 up more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you choose larger bearings.