- Joined
- Dec 20, 2012
- Messages
- 9,422
The only thing that "bothers" me about the Sherline is the 0MT tailstock and possibly not having much weight to it.
What about the 0 MT bothers you? It is adequate for the size of the lathe and works well. As for the weight of the lathe, it is very light; you can pick the whole thing up with one hand. However, when mounted to a base and in actual use the lathe doesn't move around.
The last time I looked, Taig did not have a screw cutting attachment so threads must be cut with dies. This is a deal breaker for me. Sherline sells a threading attachment that will cut more threads than just about any lathe I know of and it works really well. This is an M8 thread single pointed in 1144 Stressproof steel cut on a Sherline lathe.
I'm not a CNC guy so I cannot speak from personal experience but I can tell you that I know how my lathe feels and sounds when it is cutting well, and I know exactly what to do when something goes wrong. I know how to adjust feed on the fly to get the cut I need or how to alter depths of cut when the books and calculations are wrong. Count me amongst the dinosaurs but if I were learning to cut metal I would steer clear of CNC until I learned what I was doing.