Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Rising Fawn, GA 30738
Lots of have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Rising Fawn, GA. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract numerous individuals. There’s only on location to get the at a sensible rate and that’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal for the mill. Going with a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Naturally, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a perk. The accessibility 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 really small. Sherline also uses WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Many choose ER25, ER32 or 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, most really 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 many tool options. You can find lots of reviews on both the lathe and the mill. Popular models 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 variations for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you desire an evaluation or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Rising Fawn.
Taig likewise provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competition. In fact, you can find a lot of videos and posts describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products offer a lot more rigid methods and normally more “sturdy” overall. The Taig motors are quite weak, just like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like an absolutely different mill or lathe. Taig likewise offers a good CNC prepared mill and lathe. You can likewise opt for their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the very 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 use a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both manufactures is the absence of severe upgrades.
Sherline uses numerous parts and accessories, but not much to make it a much better machine. To start with, they headstock usages poor quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This means the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with extremely little mass implies the lathe or mill the finish quality won’t be as excellent and subject to vibration issues. For example, they use lots of lathe accessories, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole needs to be small due to the fact that the bearings are little. There is a comparable problem with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this limits its usage. Of course those in Rising Fawn, Georgia 30738 may have different needs.
There are other machine alternatives too. You can also buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other suppliers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t genuine excellent. Numerous end up either really 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 want to opt for a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a number of the hardware choices in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it offers consistent speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for several years. However, they were cumbersome at finest and really just focused on amature usage. Centroid is a well recognized commercial manufacture of mills. Much of which are 5 axis makers. The best servos to utilize for CNC on the Sherline or Taig are either DMM, Clearpath or GlockCNC brands. Integrate 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 using the Acorn hardware.
What about a much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Lots of grumble that the small chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will simply fall out. On option is to purchase a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open up more alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Especially if you choose bigger bearings.