Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Huntington, WV 25701
Many are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Huntington, WV. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to numerous people. There’s only on location to get the at a sensible cost which’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Opting for a 5C is perfect for the lathes. Naturally, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a benefit. The availability of tooling for each of these designs is exceptional. For 5C collet sets, you can get excellent quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts can be found in a variety of designs from the factory. Typically ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely little. Sherline also offers WW collet sets for very tiny work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. A lot of prefer ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a larger 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 provides one of the most versatility and lots of tool options. You can discover numerous evaluations 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, handbook and CNC prepared versions. Recently, they have added ballscrew variations for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you want a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Huntington.
Taig likewise uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In reality, you can discover a great deal of videos and articles describing Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide far more stiff ways and usually more “heavy duty” 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 various mill or lathe. Taig also provides a great CNC prepared mill and lathe. You can also choose 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 design they provide. We will do a review 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 downside with both makes is the lack of serious upgrades.
Sherline provides numerous parts and accessories, however very little to make it a much better machine. To begin with, they headstock usages bad quality bearings and the bearings are too little. This means the spindle itself requires to be little. A spindle with really little mass suggests the lathe or mill the finish quality won’t be as great and based on vibration issues. For instance, they provide many lathe accessories, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel through hole has to be small because the bearings are small. There is a comparable concern with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this limits its use. Of course those in Huntington, West Virginia 25701 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Huntington
There are other machine choices too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, in addition to other providers that offer Chinese mills and lathes. Naturally the quality isn’t real excellent. Many end up either extremely dissatisfied 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 desire to go with a CNC machine, your best choice is the Centroid Acorn. The software application and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a number of the hardware alternatives in the market. You can do stiff tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it provides consistent speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for many years. However, they were clunky at best and really just focused on amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. Many of which are 5 axis machines. The very 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 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 little chucks won’t 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 up more alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Especially if you choose larger bearings.