Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for Nocona, TX 76255
Lots of have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Nocona, TX. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract numerous individuals. There’s just on location to get the at a reasonable price and that’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Opting for a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Obviously, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a bonus. The accessibility of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get very good quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a range of designs from the factory. Usually ER16 and MT1. Both of which are very small. Sherline also provides WW collet sets for really small work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers utilize the WW collets. Many 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, the majority of actually do not care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It uses the most versatility 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 prepared variations. Recently, they have added ballscrew versions for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you desire a review or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Nocona.
Taig likewise uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In reality, you can find a great deal of videos and short articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig items offer a lot more rigid ways and generally 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 totally different mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a great CNC prepared mill and lathe. You can likewise go with 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 little. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they provide. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The nice thing is that they now provide a ballscrew alternative for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both manufactures is the lack of serious upgrades.
Sherline uses lots of 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 requires to be little. A spindle with very little mass implies the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as good and subject to vibration issues. For example, they use numerous lathe accessories, 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 small. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can just utilize ER16 collets and this restricts its usage. Of course those in Nocona, Texas 76255 may have different needs.
Video: Sherline CNC in Nocona
There are other machine alternatives too. You can likewise purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t real excellent. Many end up either extremely disappointed 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 desire to choose a CNC machine, your best bet is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far better than Mach3 or a number of the hardware options in the market. You can do rigid tapping and threading if you have an encoder. Plus, it offers consistent speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the standard for many years. However, they were clunky at finest and actually just aimed at amature use. Centroid is a well established industrial manufacture of mills. A number of which are 5 axis makers. The 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 a powerful machine. We will likewise produce reviews of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill utilizing the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Numerous grumble that the small chucks will not hold steel for cutting. The part will just fall out. On option is to buy a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter built in. This can open more choices for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Especially if you choose larger bearings.