4 inch bench vice restoration

The house next door was sold for refurbishment and after looking in the builders skip for anything useful I noticed a piece of steel poking out of the rubble, pulling it out I was amazed to find it to be an old bench vice that had been thrown out, I just had to rescue the poor thing as to many vices get miss treated these days. It had not been used much, just left in a leaking garage and very rusty so an electrolysis bath and a strip down was the first step. The strip down proved to be difficult as I could not shift the acme nut in the body as it was dovetailed, peened over and pinned into the fixed part of the vice, determined to separate the two halves I had to make a cut out in the rear of the sliding jaw to clear the nut, as this would normally limit the opening of the jaws I would have to provide some other means to replace this function, tapping the end of the screw for a stop washer sorted that out.
After cleaning and two coats of paint I now had a good as new vice. It took about a week of spare time but I enjoy this kind of thing.
I have found a rotating base handy in the past and I have a steel plate that I had planned to make a 3 point steady for my lathe no longer needed, so when I find it I will complete the job and it will replace my long suffering 3 inch one that will get the same refurb treatment.

Attachment 22316

Attachment 22317

Nice job Dan, looks like new.
Cheers, JR

olderdan you are a man after my own heart
You wouldn't believe it was the same vice. I also like this type of refurb.
I hope you don’t mind me asking but what paint did you use? nice finish
Great skip diving.
The Home Engineer

I too enjoy 'tuning' vises. Probably sold off/ traded 80% of them over the years, maybe 40 total. My favorite peeves; backlash where the jaw doesn't retract with rotation of the screw, and the screw + handle with too much clearance to hold it's setting while loading or re-positioning a part. I like a bench vise to work like a mill vise.
Fixing those is usually easy; sometimes.
First, insure the screw is straight.
Sleeve the pilot to fit the slide bore, flanged with a washer of thickness equal to the backlash - minus a couple thousandths. I've had bronze and a thin steel shim washer, hard copper or just solid mild steel. Avoid materials that gall like stainless steel.
Before assembling, find a sturdy coil spring with ID that fits screw OD, short enough to fit between stationary jaw and inside of slide with bushing in place.
Lube with bearing grease and assemble. Moving jaw will now advance or retract with barest rotation of screw AND hold any position you leave it in

Maybe a half dozen times, slide face not machined square [a spotface, more or less] enough to operate well with reduced clearance. You'll need a good sized 4 jaw, or mill & facing head, or rotary table & angle plate to correct it.

Again another facet of Toolmaking; measure and engineer processes to remedy unsatisfactory mechanical action.

Beautiful restoration - on an solid little 3" vise. I can't believe how nicely it cleaned up and shines. (I better look into electrolysis a bit more).
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I just popped a couple photos of a 6" woodworking vise I pulled off a beat-up workbench, in the garage of an estate sale (Gave $10.00 for it). It had equal parts grease 'n grime - and rust. Wish I had documented the restore, but the wife thought I was crazy for buying it.

Didn't think I'd ever get the bench dog pop-up to free up.) Lots of soap and water, rust chelator (that cost more than the vise), TLC, and Krylon (to make it look better). I also added the thrust washer visible in the pic, to take out the excess play in the screw. (I've yet to build a bench around it.)

Attachment 22322

Attachment 22323

I should mention that the colors in the pics, just aren't right. It's actually a deep burgundy, in color (over a lighter, brighter, 'flat' red, that acted as an excellent primer for the top coat.)

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Thanks olderdan! We've added your Bench Vise Restoration to our Vises category,
as well as to your builder page: olderdan's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

<div id="blocks"> <div class="block b1 pngfix"> <div class="bimg"> <div> <a href="http://www.homemadetools.net/homemade-bench-vise-restoration"> <img src="/uploads/210753/homemade-bench-vise-restoration.jpeg"/> </a> </div> </div> <div class="head pngfix"></div> <div class="left pngfix"></div> <div class="right pngfix"></div> <div class="blockover b1 pngfix"> <div class="title"> <a href="http://www.homemadetools.net/homemade-bench-vise-restoration">Bench Vise Restoration</a> <span> by <a href="http://www.homemadetools.net/builder/olderdan">olderdan</a></span> </div> <div class="tags">tags: <a href='http://www.homemadetools.net/tag/vise'>vise</a>, <a href='http://www.homemadetools.net/tag/restoration'>restoration</a> </div> </div> </div> </div>
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<!-- BEGIN /var/www/html/homemadetools/protected/modules/zeus/views/tool/postUpdate.php -->
Thanks Scotsman Hosie! We've added your Woodworking Vise Restoration to our Vises category,
as well as to your builder page: Scotsman Hosie's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

<div id="blocks"> <div class="block b1 pngfix"> <div class="bimg"> <div> <a href="http://www.homemadetools.net/homemade-woodworking-vise-restoration"> <img src="/uploads/210758/homemade-woodworking-vise-restoration.jpeg"/> </a> </div> </div> <div class="head pngfix"></div> <div class="left pngfix"></div> <div class="right pngfix"></div> <div class="blockover b1 pngfix"> <div class="title"> <a href="http://www.homemadetools.net/homemade-woodworking-vise-restoration">Woodworking Vise Restoration</a> <span> by <a href="http://www.homemadetools.net/builder/Scotsman+Hosie">Scotsman Hosie</a></span> </div> <div class="tags">tags: <a href='http://www.homemadetools.net/tag/vise'>vise</a>, <a href='http://www.homemadetools.net/tag/restoration'>restoration</a> </div> </div> </div> </div>
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Hi Home Engineer,
After using every type of paint over the years I have settled on a synthetic enamel from Paragon Paints from https://www.stationaryengineparts.com/Paragon-Paints/. Never been a fan of spray cans, they are so wasteful so I brush paint most of my motorcycle parts with this stuff.
It flows beautifully with no brush marks and dries nicely hard. RAL colours too.
Attachment 22324

Nice job on that vice even if you did it the hard way.
There is some posts here on electrolysis, I just use a 12v car battery with a charger connected to keep up the amps. Best part is it will remove paint and free up all those bolts and seized parts as well.

"Thanks Scotsman Hosie! We've added your Woodworking Vise Restoration to our Vises category,
as well as to your builder page: Scotsman Hosie's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:"
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I realized - after the fact - that I should've made this a separate forum post - as opposed to a reply. So I appreciate you doing that for me. Thanks again.

Well this post seems to have some good AD_VICE for restoring vises......just saying. nice restoration older dan. Cap.

I am always on the lookout for old vises. I have picked them up for just about next to nothing, and do just what you have done. The only ones that I have kept are a Wilton bullet vise, and a very old, very heavy Morgan Coach Builders vise. I do have a few small vices that I keep around. I have been on the lookout for a Record vice, but they are kind of sparse on this side of the pond, the English built ones anyway. Great job fixing that one up.

Olderdan, that is a very nice restoration I have an old cast steel bodied vice I need to do the same thing to someday

About a month ago I got very lucky with a great vice. For 20 euros I got one of these
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Irwin-Recor.../dp/B0002JT4KG
I already had 3 Record 125 mm vices but I just couldn't let such a bargain go by. It has 150 mm jaws and is from the heavy duty range which is made from cast steel instead of the more usual cast iron. It is a genuine Record made prior to the Irwin involvement, by all accounts these are better quality than the current ones.
It looked a bit beat up but it was just hard use, nothing was worn or damaged except that the jaw pieces needed a bit of a grind to bring them back. The screw was well greased and was not worn. I totally stripped and repainted it and it has become my most used vice in the workshop. I don't recall photographing it though.

Sounds like a real bargain find, I followed your link and could not believe the price for a new one. I have an old 5 inch Record steel vice that belonged to my uncle, I will do that one next.

I had a Record mounted on 1 of my welding rigs back in the early 80's. I thought it was cast steel until one day the fixed jaw and half of the body broke off. I welded it back together with High Ni. 500 welding rods and it never broke again.
I wasn't aware that Irwin absorbed Record, I remember when Irwin took over the Peterson tool co. their vice grip locking pliers "IMO" went down in quality by 60% I still have several old Peterson vice-grips that are in better shape than nearly new Irwin's

Quote:

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Originally Posted by olderdan

Sounds like a real bargain find, I followed your link and could not believe the price for a new one.

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Alan, before I went to see it I googled for details and like you I found the new price incredible. I would never pay that for a bench vice. I also got a few other tools from the same chap. He was English and was planning on moving back there where he would have no workshop. He only advertised on an expat website and most expats here are only after the sun, He advertised previously at higher prices but had no takers so as his departure date approached he just dropped the prices to almost giveaway values. He used to race Formula Ford, hence his need for tools.

However, your find was at an even better price.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by olderdan

There is some posts here on electrolysis, I just use a 12v car battery with a charger connected to keep up the amps. Best part is it will remove paint and free up all those bolts and seized parts as well.

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What electrolyte did you use? I usually use acid for rust removal and have not so far tried electrolysis.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Frank S

Olderdan, that is a very nice restoration I have an old cast steel bodied vice I need to do the same thing to someday

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I was wrong about it being steel, I just went out to check it. It is a Cast Iron Prentice made in New York still a pretty good old beat up vice, just has some bits broken off that I will have to make and weld back on when I get around to refurbishing it

Great job Dan: I did one of mine (a Record 4") recently as my son had tried to force it open it too wide. I didn't bother respraying like your beaut job. I have a 3" one that needs parts. I refurbished a large offset one about the time when "Sargeant Pepper told the band to play" but never built the bench for it=not enough room! At least I can clamp it on a corner when I really need to use it: it ways a ton. I did paint that one............ fire engine red. Then again it cost me AU $250 at a boot sale, way back then.
Cheers,

Ranald