Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Durham, NC 27701
Numerous have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Durham, NC. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, interest many people. There’s only on place to get the at an affordable price which’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal for the mill. Choosing 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 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 been available in a range of models from the factory. Typically ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very little. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. Most choose ER25, ER32 or perhaps ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle travel through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, most really do not care for the MT1 and hardly like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It offers one of the most flexibility and many tool choices. You can find lots of 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, handbook and CNC all set variations. Just recently, they have actually 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 Durham.
Taig likewise provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competitors. In truth, you can find a great deal of videos and articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items use a lot more rigid ways and normally more “heavy duty” overall. The Taig motors are quite weak, just like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine seem like a totally various mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a nice CNC ready mill and lathe. You can also select their digital CNC system which uses closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the very same issues as the Sherline. They are far too little. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock model they offer. We will do a review of the 5C in the future. The good thing is that they now offer a ballscrew option for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both makes is the absence of severe upgrades.
Sherline offers many parts and attachments, but not much to make it a much 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 very little mass suggests the lathe or mill the finish quality won’t be as great and based on vibration problems. For example, they provide lots of lathe devices, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the pass through hole needs to be small since the bearings are little. There is a similar problem with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this limits its usage. Of course those in Durham, North Carolina 27701 may have different needs.
Video: Taig CNC in Durham
There are other machine alternatives too. You can also purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other providers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Naturally the quality isn’t real excellent. Numerous end up either very dissatisfied or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Excellent upgrades are ballscrews, updated brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you desire 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 much of the hardware options in the market. You can do stiff tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it uses consistent speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for several years. However, they were cumbersome at best and really just aimed at amature usage. Centroid is a well recognized industrial manufacture of mills. A lot of which are 5 axis devices. The very 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 an effective machine. We will also produce evaluations of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Many complain that the little chucks will not hold steel for cutting. The part will simply fall out. On choice is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more options for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Specifically if you opt for bigger bearings.