I want to purchase the Carbide Vfd Spindle kit but 750$ all at once is a bite to my wallet I’m sure it’s worth it no doubt about it. I tried the financing but I was not approved. My question is is there a cheaper alternative that anyone recommends that can perform or out perform the Carbide Vfd spindle kit? Thank you I would really appreciate the feedback
I bought this cheaper one a couple of years ago, as a trial to see if it was any good.
I put it on a SO3 XXL I’ve got a lot of hours of use from it, and it’s still working fine.
YMMV. 
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You can use a third party spindle, I use one, lots of others do too, but, they’re quite a bit more work to set up and you need some electrical knowledge, or a friendly electrician.
The G Penny spindles have been quite popular
To install one you’ll need to make up an electrical box to mount the VFD to, probably put a power noise filter in the box and wire the spindle to the VFD. If you buy a kit of VFD (in the right voltage for where you’re using it) and spindle, the VFD will probably come configured for the spindle, but you’d be well advised to check this before powering up.
You won’t get the spindle auto start / stop or speed setting from Carbide Motion without doing some more work to connect up the speed control output to whichever VFD you end up with, this also requires some knowledge and potentially parts.
If you go with a water cooled spindle you’ll also need a reservoir and pump.
There’s lots of threads here on people adding their own spindles, how they wired them up, how they set up water cooling (you can just buy a noisy air cooled spindle) and how they connected up speed control, but be prepared to do some reading.
Also, please bear in mind, the output of the VFD can kill you, no GFCI / RCD can help you on the other side of the VFD, you must earth the spindle shell properly and don’t open up the VFD. A friendly pro electrician could be very handy if you don’t have the skills & experience yourself.
HTH
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