Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Milnor, ND 58060
Lots of are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Milnor, ND. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, interest numerous people. There’s just on location 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 bonus offer. The accessibility of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get great quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a range of designs from the factory. Normally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely small. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Many prefer ER25, ER32 or perhaps ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle pass through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, many really do not care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It offers one of the most flexibility and many tool options. You can find lots of 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 all set versions. Recently, they have added ballscrew versions for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the web if you desire a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Milnor.
Taig also offers lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competition. In truth, you can find a lot of videos and short articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide a lot more stiff methods and typically more “sturdy” overall. The Taig motors are quite weak, much like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine look like a totally different mill or lathe. Taig likewise provides 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 same problems as the Sherline. They are far too little. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock model they use. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The great thing is that they now provide a ballscrew option for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both manufactures is the lack of severe upgrades.
Sherline uses numerous parts and attachments, but not much to make it a better machine. To start with, they headstock uses poor quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This indicates the spindle itself requires to be little. A spindle with really little mass indicates the lathe or mill the surface quality will not be as excellent and based on vibration problems. For example, they provide numerous lathe accessories, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the go through hole needs to be small because the bearings are small. There is a comparable problem with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Milnor, North Dakota 58060 may have different needs.
There are other machine choices too. You can also purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t genuine good. Many end up either really dissatisfied or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they want. Excellent upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want to choose a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far much better than Mach3 or many of the hardware alternatives in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it offers continuous speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for many years. However, they were cumbersome at best and actually only focused on amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. A number of which are 5 axis makers. The best servos to use 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 evaluations of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many complain that the little chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will just fall out. On option is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter built in. This can open more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you opt for larger bearings.