Sherline & Taig CNC Mill & Lathe Upgrades, Reviews for North Washington, IA 50661
Many have an interest in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the North Washington, IA. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, appeals to numerous people. There’s only on place to get the at an affordable cost which’s GlockCNC. Updating to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Going with a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Of course, you would require to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a benefit. The accessibility of tooling for each of these designs is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get very good quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts come in a range of models from the factory. Generally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely small. Sherline likewise provides WW collet sets for extremely tiny work. Mainly watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. A lot of prefer ER25, ER32 or perhaps ER40 collet sizes with a larger spindle pass through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the very best. For Sherline mills, most truly 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 versatility and many tool choices. 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 also come in CNC, manual and CNC all set variations. Recently, they have included ballscrew versions for sale. This is far much better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you desire a review or comparison of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near North Washington.
Taig also uses lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In fact, you can find a great deal of videos and articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products provide much more stiff methods and usually more “sturdy” overall. The Taig motors are pretty weak, just like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine look like a completely various mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a nice CNC all set 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 exact same issues as the Sherline. They are far too little. 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 option for their mill and lathe. Plus, the deal a “gang tool” lathe. The downside with both manufactures is the absence of serious upgrades.
Sherline uses many parts and accessories, however very little to make it a much better machine. To start with, they headstock uses bad quality bearings and the bearings are too small. This suggests the spindle itself needs to be small. A spindle with really little mass means the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as excellent and based on vibration issues. For instance, they provide lots of lathe accessories, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the pass through hole has to be little since the bearings are small. There is a similar concern with the mill. You can just use ER16 collets and this restricts its use. Of course those in North Washington, Iowa 50661 may have different needs.
Video: Taig CNC in North Washington
There are other machine options too. You can also buy from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, together with other suppliers that use Chinese mills and lathes. Obviously the quality isn’t real excellent. Lots of wind up either very dissatisfied 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 desire to choose a CNC machine, your best option is the Centroid Acorn. The software and hardware is far 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 continuous speed for turning applications. Mach3 and Mach4 were the requirement for several years. However, they were cumbersome at best and truly only aimed at amature usage. Centroid is a well established business manufacture of mills. A lot 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 evaluations of the Taig CNC mill and Sherline CNC mill using the Acorn hardware.
What about a much better jaw chuck for the lathe? Numerous complain that the small chucks won’t hold steel for cutting. The part will simply fall out. On option is to purchase a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more alternatives for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you go with larger bearings.