Sherline & Taig Lathe & Mill Upgrades, Reviews for Red Bud, IL 62278
Lots of are interested in ISO20, IS030, BT30 and 5C headstocks for both Sherline and Taig mills and lathes in the Red Bud, IL. Automatic tool changers, or ATC, attract many people. There’s just on location to get the at a reasonable price and that’s GlockCNC. Upgrading to a ISO20 or BT30 is perfect for the mill. Opting for a 5C is ideal for the lathes. Of course, you would need to upgrade the headstock, bearings and motor. High speed balancing is also a bonus offer. The accessibility of tooling for each of these models is excellent. For 5C collet sets, you can get excellent quality from Hardinge.
Sherline headstocks and parts can be found in a variety of models from the factory. Generally ER16 and MT1. Both of which are extremely little. Sherline likewise uses WW collet sets for very small work. Primarily watchmakers and clockmakers use the WW collets. The majority of choose ER25, ER32 or even ER40 collet sizes with a larger spindle travel through hole. The 5C collet for the Sherline lathe would be the best. For Sherline mills, most truly don’t care for the MT1 and barely like the ER16. An R8 spindle with a low profile would be best. It provides one of the most versatility and many tool choices. You can find numerous 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 prepared variations. Recently, they have added ballscrew versions for sale. This is far better than the older leadscrew type. Search the internet if you want an evaluation or contrast of ballscrews compared to leadscrews. There are suppliers near Red Bud.
Taig also provides lathes and mills. It’s Sherlines primary competition. In fact, you can discover a great deal of videos and short articles referring to Taig vs Sherline. The Taig products offer much more rigid ways and typically more “sturdy” overall. The Taig motors are quite weak, just like the Sherline motors. A high quality brushless motor can make the machine appear like an absolutely different mill or lathe. Taig likewise uses a nice CNC ready mill and lathe. You can likewise opt for their digital CNC system which utilizes closed-looped steppers and Mach3 software. The Taig spindles have the very same issues as the Sherline. They are far too small. The only exception is the 5C collet headstock design they offer. We will do an evaluation of the 5C in the future. The great thing is that they now use a ballscrew choice for their mill and lathe. Plus, the offer a “gang tool” lathe. The disadvantage with both manufactures is the absence of serious upgrades.
Sherline provides numerous 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 little. A spindle with very little mass means the lathe or mill the finish quality will not be as good and subject to vibration issues. For example, they offer numerous lathe devices, however you can’t get a 5C headstock or ER25, ER32 or ER40. Plus, the travel 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 limits its usage. Of course those in Red Bud, Illinois 62278 may have different needs.
Video: Taig CNC in Red Bud
There are other machine choices too. You can also purchase from Grizzly or Harbor Freight, along with other providers that provide Chinese mills and lathes. Of course the quality isn’t real excellent. Many end up either really disappointed or doing a great deal of modifications to get the machine to do what they desire. Exceptional upgrades are ballscrews, updated brushless motor, encoder for threading and so on.
If you desire 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 lot of the hardware options 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 standard for several years. However, they were clunky at best and really just aimed at amature use. Centroid is a well recognized business manufacture of mills. Much 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. Integrate 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 using the Acorn hardware.
What about a better jaw chuck for the lathe? Numerous complain that the little chucks will not hold steel for cutting. The part will just fall out. On option is to purchase a headstock with a jaw chuck adapter integrated in. This can open more options for 5″ or 6″ chuck. Particularly if you go with bigger bearings.