Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Tulsa, OK 74115
Lots of have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Tulsa, OK. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract numerous individuals. There’s only on place to get the at a reasonable rate and that’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Opting for a 5C is perfect for the lathes. Of course, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a bonus. The availability of tooling for each of these designs is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get great quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts can be found in a variety of designs from the factory. Normally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very small. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. Many choose ER25, ER32 and even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle pass through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, most actually don’t care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It uses the most flexibility and lots of tool choices. You can find numerous reviews on both the lathe and the mill. Popular designs are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The also can be found in CNC, manual and CNC all set variations. Just recently, they have included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the web if you want an evaluation or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Tulsa.
Taig likewise uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competitors. In truth, you can discover a lot of videos and posts referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items use far more rigid ways and typically more “strong” in general. The Taig motors are quite weak, just like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine seem like a totally different mill or lathe. Taig also uses a great 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 same problems as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they offer. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The nice thing is that they now use a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The drawback with both manufactures is the lack of serious upgrades.
Sherline uses many parts and accessories, but very little to make it a better machine. To start with, they headstock uses poor quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This means the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with really little mass implies the lathe or mill the surface quality will not be as excellent and subject to vibration issues. For instance, they use numerous lathe devices, 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 small. There is a comparable issue with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Tulsa, Oklahoma 74115 may have different needs.
There are other machine options too. You can also buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other suppliers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t real great. Lots of wind up either extremely dissatisfied or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Exceptional upgrades are ballscrews, updated brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want to opt for a CNC machine, your best option is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far much better than Mach3 or many of the hardware choices in the market. You can do stiff tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it uses continuous speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for many years. However, they were cumbersome at finest and actually just targeted at amature use. Centroid is a well recognized business 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. Combine that with the Centroid Acorn and you will have a powerful machine. We will likewise produce evaluations of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Lots of grumble that the little chucks will not 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.