Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Elko, NV 89801
Many have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Elko, NV. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to numerous people. There’s just on place to get the at a reasonable cost and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Choosing a 5C is perfect for the lathes. Obviously, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a benefit. The availability of tooling for each of these models is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get very good quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a variety of models from the factory. Usually ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely small. Sherline likewise provides WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Many prefer ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle pass through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, a lot of actually don’t care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It uses the most versatility and lots of tool choices. You can find many reviews on both the lathe and the mill. Popular designs are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The also come in CNC, manual and CNC prepared 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 Elko.
Taig likewise offers lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In fact, you can discover a great deal of videos and articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items provide a lot more stiff ways and generally more “heavy duty” in general. The Taig motors are quite weak, just like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine look like a totally various mill or lathe. Taig likewise offers a nice CNC prepared 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 problems as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they use. 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 drawback with both makes is the lack of severe upgrades.
Sherline offers many parts and accessories, but very little to make it a much better machine. To start with, they headstock usages bad quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This indicates the spindle itself needs to be little. A spindle with extremely little mass implies the lathe or mill the surface quality won’t be as good and based on vibration problems. For example, they use lots of lathe accessories, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole has to be little because the bearings are small. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this limits its usage. Of course those in Elko, Nevada 89801 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Elko
There are other machine choices too. You can likewise buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other providers that provide Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t genuine excellent. Lots of end up either extremely dissatisfied or doing a great deal 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 go with a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far much better than Mach3 or a lot of the hardware choices 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 requirement for many years. Nevertheless, they were cumbersome at best and actually just targeted at amature usage. Centroid is a well recognized commercial manufacture of mills. Much of which are 5 axis makers. The best servos to use for CNC on the Sherline or Taig are either DMM, Clearpath or GlockCNC brands. Combine that with the Centroid Acorn and you will have an effective machine. We will likewise produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill using the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Lots of complain that the little 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 integrated in. This can open up more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you opt for larger bearings.