Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Chester, CA 96020
Many are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Chester, CA. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, interest lots of people. There’s only on place to get the at an affordable cost and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Choosing a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Of course, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a bonus. The schedule 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 been available in a variety of models from the factory. Generally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very little. Sherline likewise uses WW collet sets for very tiny work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. Most choose ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a larger spindle travel through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, the majority of really 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 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 can be found in CNC, manual and CNC all set versions. Recently, they have added ballscrew variations for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you desire a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Chester.
Taig also provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In fact, you can find a lot of videos and short articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide far more rigid methods and normally more “heavy duty” overall. The Taig motors are pretty weak, similar to the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine seem like a totally different mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a great CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also go with their digital CNC system which uses closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the very same issues 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 nice thing is that they now provide a ballscrew choice for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both manufactures is the absence of major upgrades.
Sherline provides lots of parts and attachments, but very little to make it a much better machine. To begin with, they headstock usages poor quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This means the spindle itself requires to be small. A spindle with extremely little mass implies the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as good and subject to vibration issues. For instance, they provide many lathe devices, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole has to be small since the bearings are little. There is a comparable concern with the mill. You can only utilize ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Chester, California 96020 may have different needs.
Video: Taig CNC in Chester
There are other machine options too. You can also buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other suppliers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t genuine excellent. Numerous end up either extremely disappointed or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Exceptional upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded 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 and hardware is far better than Mach3 or much 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 requirement for many years. However, they were clunky at best and truly only targeted at amature use. Centroid is a well recognized business manufacture of mills. A lot of which are 5 axis makers. 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 an effective machine. We will also 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 small 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 alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you go with larger bearings.