Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Colorado Springs, CO 80913
Lots of are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Colorado Springs, CO. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract many people. There’s just on location to get the at a sensible cost which’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 need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a perk. The availability of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get great quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts can be found in a range of models from the factory. Typically ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely small. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for very tiny work. Generally watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Most prefer ER25, ER32 and even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle pass through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, most truly do not care for the MT1 and hardly like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It uses one of the most flexibility and numerous tool choices. You can find many evaluations 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, handbook and CNC prepared variations. Just recently, they have included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the web if you want an evaluation or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Colorado Springs.
Taig likewise provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In fact, you can find a great deal of videos and articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products offer far more rigid methods and usually more “heavy duty” 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 completely various mill or lathe. Taig also provides a great CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also 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 model they offer. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The great thing is that they now use a ballscrew choice for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both makes is the lack of major upgrades.
Sherline offers lots of parts and accessories, however very little to make it a better machine. To begin with, they headstock usages poor quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This implies the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with very little mass indicates the lathe or mill the surface quality will not be as excellent and based on vibration problems. For instance, they offer many lathe accessories, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole needs to be small since the bearings are small. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Colorado Springs, Colorado 80913 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Colorado Springs
There are other machine options too. You can also buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other suppliers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Naturally the quality isn’t real good. Many wind up either really dissatisfied or doing a great deal of modifications to get the machine to do what they want. Outstanding upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you want 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 a number of the hardware alternatives in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it provides constant speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the standard for many years. Nevertheless, they were clunky at finest and truly only targeted at amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. A number of which are 5 axis machines. The best servos to utilize 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 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? Lots of complain that the little chucks will not 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 more options for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you opt for bigger bearings.