first and foremost I love my Taig mill. I've had it for around 15 years now and it's the machine I learned CNC on. It's been thru many an upgrade to this point. It started with one of those terrible Xylotex driver boards which was upgraded to a G540. After that a 4th axis was added. Then the big upgrade...The spindle motor was upgraded to a 1hp DC treadmill motor. What a difference that made, it really woke up the mill. I even filled the column and base tubing with epoxy granite. Even with all those upgrades I've always fought with the leadscrews. I could never seem to get them tight enough to eliminate backlash, yet loose enough so I could still jog at a descent rate without stalling the motors. So this is something I've always wanted to do, but I can't justify the price tag Taig lists to convert a mill to ballscrews. So I'm going to try some of the chines 12mm ballscrews. So here's what I'm starting with:


and here's what I'm shooting for:



So I'm going to start with the Z axis. There's not much room so the extrusion needs to be machined out a bit.


fits pretty well.




stay tuned for more fun!