Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Columbus, OH 43212
Many have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Columbus, OH. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract many people. There’s only on location to get the at a sensible price and that’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Going with a 5C is perfect for the lathes. Of course, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a bonus. The availability of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get excellent quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts been available in a range of models from the factory. Normally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very small. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for very tiny work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Most prefer ER25, ER32 or perhaps ER40 collet sizes with a larger spindle travel through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, many really do not 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 flexibility 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 been available in CNC, manual and CNC all set versions. Recently, they have included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Search the web if you desire a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Columbus.
Taig likewise uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In fact, you can discover a great deal of videos and short articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products use a lot more rigid ways and typically 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 different mill or lathe. Taig likewise provides a nice 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 little. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock model they offer. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The good thing is that they now offer a ballscrew choice for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both makes is the absence of serious upgrades.
Sherline provides lots of parts and accessories, however not much to make it a better machine. To begin with, they headstock usages bad quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This indicates the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with really little mass suggests the lathe or mill the finish quality won’t be as excellent and based on vibration issues. For example, they provide lots of lathe devices, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the pass through hole has to be little due to the fact that the bearings are little. There is a similar issue with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this limits its usage. Of course those in Columbus, Ohio 43212 may have different needs.
There are other machine choices too. You can also buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other providers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t genuine great. Numerous wind up either really disappointed or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they want. Excellent upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you prefer to opt for a CNC machine, your best bet is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far much better than Mach3 or a lot of the hardware options 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 several years. Nevertheless, they were cumbersome at finest and really only targeted at amature usage. Centroid is a well recognized industrial manufacture of mills. Much of which are 5 axis makers. The best servos to use for CNC on the Sherline or Taig are either DMM, Clearpath or GlockCNC brands. Combine that with the Centroid Acorn and you will have an effective machine. We will also produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill using the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many grumble that the small chucks will not hold steel for cutting. The part will simply fall out. On alternative is to purchase a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Especially if you go with bigger bearings.