Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Lansing, WV 25862
Many have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Lansing, WV. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, interest many people. There’s only on location to get the at a sensible price and that’s GlockCNC. Upgrading 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 perk. The availability of tooling for each of these models is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get excellent quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a range of designs from the factory. Normally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are really little. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for very tiny work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Most 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 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 provides one of the most versatility and lots of tool choices. 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 likewise come in CNC, handbook and CNC ready versions. Recently, they have included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the internet if you desire a review or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Lansing.
Taig likewise uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In reality, you can discover a lot of videos and posts referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide much more rigid methods and generally more “strong” in general. The Taig motors are pretty weak, much like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine seem like a completely different mill or lathe. Taig also provides a good CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also choose their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software application. The Taig spindles have the very same issues as the Sherline. They are far too little. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they provide. We will do a review of the 5C in the future. The nice thing is that they now use a ballscrew choice for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both produces is the absence of severe upgrades.
Sherline uses many parts and accessories, but very little to make it a better machine. To begin with, they headstock uses poor quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This indicates the spindle itself needs to be little. A spindle with really little mass implies the lathe or mill the surface quality won’t be as good and based on vibration problems. For example, they use many lathe devices, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the pass through hole needs to be little because the bearings are small. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this limits its use. Of course those in Lansing, West Virginia 25862 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Lansing
There are other machine choices 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 wind up either very dissatisfied or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they want. Outstanding upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want to go with a CNC machine, your best bet 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 stiff 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 finest and actually just focused on amature use. Centroid is a well recognized commercial manufacture of mills. Much of which are 5 axis devices. The very best servos to utilize 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 also produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill using the Acorn hardware.
What about a much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many 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 built in. This can open more alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you choose bigger bearings.