Still struggling with this decision. I personally believe the Taig Mill is better than the Sherline - our late friend Jim B steered me that direction. Im not sure about the lathe though. The Taig Lathe is half of the price of the Sherline however the Sherline gets better reviews online and has DRO. Hard call - I did sell my Proxxon MF70, Preac Saw, and Unimat to help pay for this purchase. The other route I could go is buy a wood lathe and the Taig for metal work which could be less than the price of the Sherline.
Taig is sturdier than Sherline and has the great advantage of having a rack feed. Having to twiddle a fine-pitch leadscrew gets old very quickly. I do not see this mentioned much but it having owned small lathes with a fixed leadscrew I can say it is not a system that lends itself to ease of use. DRO on a lathe is not so much of a boon as it is on a mill but if needed a simple DRO can be made to fit the Taig.
Although looking a bit goofy and Heath Robinson, the Taig is an extremely well designed lathe with great rigidity and cheap enough to buy plenty of tooling with the money saved.
Lathe Question
in Modeling tools and Workshop Equipment
Posted
Taig is sturdier than Sherline and has the great advantage of having a rack feed. Having to twiddle a fine-pitch leadscrew gets old very quickly. I do not see this mentioned much but it having owned small lathes with a fixed leadscrew I can say it is not a system that lends itself to ease of use. DRO on a lathe is not so much of a boon as it is on a mill but if needed a simple DRO can be made to fit the Taig.
Although looking a bit goofy and Heath Robinson, the Taig is an extremely well designed lathe with great rigidity and cheap enough to buy plenty of tooling with the money saved.