Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Hammond, LA 70404
Lots of have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Hammond, LA. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract numerous people. There’s just on place to get the at a reasonable rate which’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is ideal for the mill. Choosing a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Naturally, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is likewise a bonus. The schedule of tooling for each of these designs is outstanding. 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. Generally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely little. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. Many choose ER25, ER32 and even ER40 collet sizes with a bigger spindle go 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 options. You can find lots of reviews on both the lathe and the mill. Popular models are the 2000, 5400, 4000 and 4500 in metric and inch. The likewise been available in CNC, handbook and CNC prepared variations. Recently, they have included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Browse the internet if you want an evaluation or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Hammond.
Taig also provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines main competition. In fact, you can discover a lot of videos and posts describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items use a lot more stiff methods and normally more “sturdy” 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 totally various mill or lathe. Taig likewise offers a great CNC ready 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 issues as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock model they provide. We will do a review 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 downside with both produces is the absence of major upgrades.
Sherline offers many parts and attachments, but very little to make it a better machine. To start with, they headstock uses bad quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This indicates the spindle itself requires to be small. A spindle with really little mass implies the lathe or mill the finish quality won’t be as good and based on vibration problems. For instance, they provide numerous lathe accessories, but you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole needs to be little since the bearings are little. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can only use ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Hammond, Louisiana 70404 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Hammond
There are other machine choices too. You can likewise buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other suppliers that provide Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t real great. Many end up either very disappointed or doing a lot of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Outstanding upgrades are ballscrews, upgraded brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you prefer to go with a CNC machine, your best option is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far much better than Mach3 or a number of the hardware choices in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it offers constant speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for many years. However, they were cumbersome at best and actually just aimed at amature usage. Centroid is a well established commercial manufacture of mills. Many of which are 5 axis machines. The best servos to utilize for CNC on the Sherline or Taig are either DMM, Clearpath or GlockCNC brands. Combine that with the Centroid Acorn and you will have a powerful machine. We will also produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Numerous grumble that the small chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will just fall out. On alternative is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter built in. This can open more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you go with bigger bearings.
