Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Belton, MO 64012
Lots of have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Belton, MO. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to many people. There’s only on location to get the at a sensible rate and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Going with a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Naturally, you would require to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a bonus. The accessibility of tooling for each of these designs is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get excellent quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a range of models from the factory. Normally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are really little. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for extremely small work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Many choose ER25, ER32 and even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle travel through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, a lot of truly do not care for the MT1 and hardly like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It provides the most versatility and lots of tool options. You can find numerous evaluations on both the lathe and the mill. Popular models are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The likewise come in CNC, manual and CNC ready versions. Recently, they have added ballscrew variations for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Search the web if you want a review or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Belton.
Taig likewise uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competition. In truth, you can find a lot of videos and posts describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide far more stiff methods and normally more “strong” in general. The Taig motors are pretty weak, similar to the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine look like a completely various mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a great CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also choose their digital CNC system which uses closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the very same problems as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock model they provide. We will do a review of the 5C in the future. The good 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 produces is the lack of severe upgrades.
Sherline uses many parts and accessories, 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 indicates the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with extremely little mass means the lathe or mill the surface quality will not be as good and subject to vibration issues. For example, they offer many lathe devices, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the go through hole has to be small because the bearings are small. There is a comparable issue with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its use. Of course those in Belton, Missouri 64012 may have different needs.
Video: Taig CNC in Belton
There are other machine alternatives too. You can also purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other suppliers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t genuine excellent. Numerous end up either extremely disappointed or doing a great deal of modifications to get the machine to do what they want. Outstanding upgrades are ballscrews, updated brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you desire to choose a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a number of the hardware options in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it offers constant speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the standard for many years. However, they were cumbersome at best and really just targeted at amature use. Centroid is a well recognized commercial manufacture of mills. Much of which are 5 axis makers. 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 also produce evaluations of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill using the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many grumble that the small chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will simply fall out. On choice is to purchase a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you go with bigger bearings.