Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Kansas City, MO 64132
Numerous have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Kansas City, MO. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, interest numerous people. There’s only on place to get the at a reasonable rate and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal 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 also a benefit. 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 can be found in a range of models from the factory. Typically ER16 and MT1. Both of which are really small. Sherline also uses WW collet sets for extremely small work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Most prefer 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, the majority of truly don’t care for the MT1 and hardly like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It provides one of the most flexibility and lots of tool options. You can find numerous reviews 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, handbook and CNC ready variations. Just recently, they have included ballscrew variations for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the internet if you desire an evaluation or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Kansas City.
Taig also provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In truth, you can find a great deal of videos and short articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products offer far more stiff methods and normally more “strong” overall. The Taig motors are pretty weak, similar to the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine seem like a completely different mill or lathe. Taig likewise provides a great CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also opt for their digital CNC system which uses closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software application. The Taig spindles have the exact same issues as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they provide. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The good thing is that they now offer a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both makes is the absence of major upgrades.
Sherline uses many parts and attachments, however not much to make it a better machine. To begin with, they headstock uses bad quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This suggests the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with very little mass means the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as good and based on vibration issues. For example, they use many lathe accessories, however 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 similar problem with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this limits its use. Of course those in Kansas City, Missouri 64132 may have different needs.
There are other machine options too. You can also purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t real good. Numerous end up either extremely dissatisfied 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 desire to go with a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far better than Mach3 or much of the hardware choices in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it provides continuous speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for many years. Nevertheless, they were cumbersome at best and really just aimed at amature use. Centroid is a well established business manufacture of mills. Many 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 brand names. Combine that with the Centroid Acorn and you will have a powerful machine. We will also produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Numerous complain that the small chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will just fall out. On option is to purchase a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter built in. This can open up more options for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you go with larger bearings.