Vises - "a leg to stand on"

[mitch4ging]

Nice Indian, Square Peg! Great addition!

 

[garry3]

Good info, all. Thank you very much.


Here's a photo of my 6.25" - 145 pound Indian Chief leaning against my smaller 85 pound 6" vise. . I grabbed this one for $95.

That's a beast! Good price on that big boy also.

 

[garry3]

Agent H, Square Peg, Steve,
Thanks for sharing all your research, great stuff!
Agent H,
There are a couple of good forums with great info on vises and anvils which you may have been talking sbout, such as IforgeIron and anvil fire, great folks and info. thats where I started research when I started down this road. bladesmithsforum. This is another great source I just recently found and joined. Thanks again for all the info.


Garry3, nice vise! Would love to dig one up as well!

Mitch

Them screws are very common at flea markets. Its padded with shoe insoles and scrap leather. Very kind to even soft wood. The handle is a draw knifed black locust and the end caps I made with a hole saw. Very easy.

 

[Agent_H]

Its hard to have to many vices and clamps in a shop. I am always looking to up grade also.

This is my other leg vice. It gets almost as much use as my blacksmith vice. It was gifted to me and of coarse the value is in the hardware. I replaced all the wood components and mounted it at the end of a work bench. It has padded jaws and I can shave wood from either end of a stave that is clamped because it is higher than my work bench. The bottom leg is adjustable by a simple peg and board.

That is a fine leg vice! Garry, black locust is nice. I'd be interested in the peg and board arrangement on the other side. I just picked up a cherry wood dowel (3/4") to make a handle for a flush-mount Wilton I acquired for a song at a garage sale. I picked up some pre-turned caps similar from a woodcraft supply store yesterday hoping that they would be snug but I’ve got about 1/8th inch of space around them. I thought about some of those round rubber gasket washers maybe to snug it up or even give a buffer against the end caps and the clamp screw bushing – any recommendations on that would be great.

I found myself zooming in on your workspace there - nice looking steel sitting around there as well.

Genuine Idaho.

That thing is really neat - thanks for that picture.

Good info, all. Thank you very much.


Here's a photo of my 6.25" - 145 pound Indian Chief leaning against my smaller 85 pound 6" vise. . I grabbed this one for $95.

$95? That would have come home with me also. That thing weighs almost as much as me… I’m still an inch or two taller though I guess.
First, thanks for dragging it out to share – 145lbs isn’t too much to move for a grown man but mine is only 60lbs and I find it to be an “unbalanced load” at that. Hand cart? I have read they were built weighing 240lbs+.

That Indian Chief looks like a “bully”.

Noticed the base you have the foot set in – I am having trouble figuring out it’s a block of metal or wood (thought it was wood using my phone but this morning on a larger screen it looks like metal). If it is metal, is that one of the blocks you mentioned earlier that you usually don’t find with them nowadays?

Being as you have one set up and running well, does the Chief still require some work or is it functional?

Regardless, that is a great piece of equipment.

 

[Square_peg]

This is my other leg vice.

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Beautiful and practical. I'd love to have a vise like that.

 

[mitch4ging]

Garry,
:thumbup:Very high on the cool factor, nice job.

 

[Square_peg]

.... – 145lbs isn’t too much to move for a grown man but mine is only 60lbs and I find it to be an “unbalanced load” at that. Hand cart? I have read they were built weighing 240lbs+.

That Indian Chief looks like a “bully”.

Noticed the base you have the foot set in – I am having trouble figuring out it’s a block of metal or wood (thought it was wood using my phone but this morning on a larger screen it looks like metal). If it is metal, is that one of the blocks you mentioned earlier that you usually don’t find with them nowadays?

Being as you have one set up and running well, does the Chief still require some work or is it functional?

Yeah, 145 lbs. is a bugger to move around. I move it with on a hand truck. That is the original steel 'brick' for that vise. The only thing not original is the spring - it's a piece of leaf spring.

 

[rjdankert]

. . . I'd be interested in the peg and board arrangement on the other side. . . .

Here is one Like Garry's (I think):

See the whole article here.

. . . I just picked up a cherry wood dowel (3/4") to make a handle for a flush-mount Wilton I acquired for a song at a garage sale. I picked up some pre-turned caps similar from a woodcraft supply store yesterday hoping that they would be snug but I’ve got about 1/8th inch of space around them. . .

An other option to keep the handle on:

Bob

 

[Square_peg]

Here is one Like Garry's (I think):

Thanks. One like that made of ironwood or similar would be nice.

 

[Lieblad]

.....

 

[Agent_H]

There is a lot thinking, doing, craftsmanship, and experience running around in this forum.

I mean, significantly more than "What type of axe do I need?" responses. (those are great too)

Bob -Thanks for the link/pictures to the leg post set-up project and the handle option - is that your handiwork?

 

[rjdankert]

Thanks. One like that made of ironwood or similar would be nice.

U R Welcome. Ironwood:thumbup:

 

[rjdankert]

. . .
Bob -Thanks for the link/pictures to the leg post set-up project and the handle option . . .

U R Welcome.

. . . is that your handiwork?

It is a twin screw "Moxon" vice. Although I have a wood lathe, I ended up buying maple dowels for the screws. The other dowels were leftovers from previous projects (white oak IIRC). I have some taps and dies for wood that I used to cut the threads for the screws and "nuts". The rest came from rough sawn stock. Maple jaws and walnut knobs. As to handy (just between you and I - DO NOT share this with anyone), the rear jaw was my second attempt. The threads didn't align correctly on the first one so I had to start over.

Bob

 

[garry3]

Here is one Like Garry's (I think):

See the whole article here.





An other option to keep the handle on:

Bob

Yes, that is it.:thumbup:



Agent H. Threaded pipes make suitable handles also with there ends capped. Indestructible. The rubber washer would be a good idea and one that my handle lacks. I have popped my handle caps off before because of it.

 

[garry3]

The one I put together differs from most of them. It is higher than my work bench to enable me to work on both ends of a clamped stave. It also has jaws. The legs are made from walnut that was gifted to me and I cut them to actually have jaws as I was going to make them padded and wanted no chance of the stave coming into contact with the tacks that held on the leather or the hard wood legs and marring my work.

Despite the fact that it is made with high quality materials I did not really finish it to look nice. There are saw marks left on it and the purple heart end caps are left just as they came out from the whole saw. I just needed it done and had some decent wood laying around.

 

[rjdankert]

Here is a post vise for y'all

Bob

 

[Miller '72]

I bet the pictures of vises in this thread no longer available for me to see...are absolutely beautiful.

Here is my post vise I recently picked up.
I have yet to look into it, but what I found on the vise for information so far is this.

New London
CONN
NO 60

 

[Square_peg]

As far as my best tool purchases ever it's a toss up between my leg vise and my drill press. Both indispensable tools. But I'm leaning toward the leg vise.

 

[Agent_H]

I bet the pictures of vises in this thread no longer available for me to see...are absolutely beautiful.

Here is my post vise I recently picked up.
I have yet to look into it, but what I found on the vise for information so far is this.

New London
CONN
NO 60

The guys at garage journal have some information on Joseph Hyde New London Vise Works:
https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-387740.html

It's a start

 

[mitch4ging]

I bet the pictures of vises in this thread no longer available for me to see...are absolutely beautiful.

Here is my post vise I recently picked up.
I have yet to look into it, but what I found on the vise for information so far is this.

New London
CONN
NO 60

As far as my best tool purchases ever it's a toss up between my leg vise and my drill press. Both indispensable tools. But I'm leaning toward the leg vise.

I agree with Agent H, just a great tool, especially if you are doing any forging.
The two I have were just as rusted as yours. To clean it, I just set up a fairly large electrolysis tank to get the majority of the rust off.
Before killing yourself on further cleaning, the important part is the screw and the box. The box is the female thread end. If the threads on either end are too worn, then it's just about worthless, especially the box end.
If they are still in good shape, the rest looks to be in fairly good condition. Just make sure the leg spring can still kick out the jaw, but it's easily replaced, even just some mild steel strapping will work.

The leg has been repaired on the bottom, but that shouldn't effect it any.

Hope it cleans up and is workable for you!