Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Butte, MT 59702
Many have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Butte, MT. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to numerous people. There’s just on location to get the at an affordable price and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal for the mill. Going with a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Obviously, you would require to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a perk. The availability of tooling for each of these models is outstanding. For 5C collet sets, you can get very good quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a variety of models from the factory. Usually ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very small. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for very small work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. The majority of choose 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, the majority of truly do not care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It provides the most versatility and lots of tool options. You can find numerous evaluations on both the lathe and the mill. Popular models are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The likewise come in CNC, handbook and CNC ready variations. Just recently, they have added ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Search the web if you want a review or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Butte.
Taig also offers lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competitors. In fact, you can find a lot of videos and articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide far more stiff methods and generally more “strong” overall. The Taig motors are quite weak, similar to the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like an absolutely different mill or lathe. Taig likewise provides a great CNC prepared mill and lathe. You can also go with 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 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 provide a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The drawback with both manufactures is the absence of major upgrades.
Sherline uses many parts and attachments, but very little to make it a better machine. To begin with, they headstock uses poor quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This implies the spindle itself requires to be small. A spindle with extremely little mass means the lathe or mill the surface quality won’t be as excellent and based on vibration issues. For example, they provide numerous lathe accessories, but 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 little. There is a comparable problem with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this limits its usage. Of course those in Butte, Montana 59702 may have different needs.
There are other machine alternatives too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, together with other suppliers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t real good. Numerous wind up either extremely disappointed or doing a great deal 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 desire to opt for a CNC machine, your best option is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a lot of the hardware choices in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it provides continuous speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the standard for many years. Nevertheless, they were cumbersome at finest and truly just aimed at amature usage. Centroid is a well established business manufacture of mills. A lot of which are 5 axis devices. The best servos to use 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 likewise 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 just fall out. On alternative is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you choose bigger bearings.