Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Chula Vista, CA 91913
Many are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Chula Vista, CA. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, interest numerous individuals. There’s only on place to get the at a sensible rate which’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Going with a 5C is perfect for the lathes. Naturally, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a bonus. The accessibility of tooling for each of these models is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get excellent quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts can be found in a range of designs from the factory. Generally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very small. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for extremely small work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. A lot of choose ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a larger spindle go through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, the majority of truly don’t 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 versatility and lots of tool choices. You can find many 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 variations. Just recently, they have added ballscrew variations for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the internet if you desire a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Chula Vista.
Taig also uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competitors. In fact, you can find a great deal of videos and short articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items provide a lot more stiff methods and typically more “strong” in general. The Taig motors are quite weak, much like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like a completely different mill or lathe. Taig also uses a nice CNC prepared mill and lathe. You can likewise opt for 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 small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they use. We will do a review 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 severe upgrades.
Sherline uses lots of parts and accessories, but very little to make it a much better machine. To start with, they headstock usages poor quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This indicates the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with very little mass implies the lathe or mill the surface quality won’t be as great and based on vibration issues. For instance, they offer numerous lathe accessories, but 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 small. There is a similar issue with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this limits its use. Of course those in Chula Vista, California 91913 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Chula Vista
There are other machine alternatives too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other suppliers that provide Chinese mills and lathes. Naturally the quality isn’t real excellent. Many wind up either really dissatisfied or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Exceptional upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you prefer to choose a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far better than Mach3 or much of the hardware alternatives 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. However, they were cumbersome at finest and really just focused on amature use. Centroid is a well established commercial manufacture of mills. Many of which are 5 axis devices. 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 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 just fall out. On option is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more options for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you choose larger bearings.