Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Novato, CA 94949
Many are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Novato, CA. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to many individuals. There’s only on place to get the at an affordable price and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Choosing a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Obviously, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a perk. The schedule of tooling for each of these designs is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get very good quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a variety of designs from the factory. Usually ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very small. Sherline also uses WW collet sets for really small work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. Many prefer ER25, ER32 or perhaps 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, many actually don’t care for the MT1 and hardly like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It uses the most flexibility and numerous tool options. You can find many evaluations on both the lathe and the mill. Popular models are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The also can be found in CNC, manual and CNC all set variations. Recently, they have actually included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the web if you desire a review or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Novato.
Taig also offers lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In reality, you can find a lot of videos and short articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products use far more rigid ways and normally more “strong” in general. The Taig motors are quite weak, similar to the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like a totally various mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a good CNC ready mill and lathe. You can likewise go with their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the same issues as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they use. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The great thing is that they now use a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both makes is the lack of serious upgrades.
Sherline provides numerous parts and accessories, however very little to make it a much better machine. To begin with, they headstock usages bad quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This means the spindle itself needs to be little. A spindle with very little mass suggests the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as great and based on vibration issues. For example, they use numerous lathe devices, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the pass through hole needs to be small since the bearings are small. There is a similar issue with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its use. Of course those in Novato, California 94949 may have different needs.
Video: Taig CNC in Novato
There are other machine alternatives too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Naturally the quality isn’t real excellent. Lots of wind up either really disappointed 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 desire to go with a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far much 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 several years. However, they were cumbersome at best and really only aimed at amature use. Centroid is a well established commercial manufacture of mills. Many 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. 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 much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many grumble that the little 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 integrated in. This can open up more alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you go with larger bearings.