2 Attachment(s)
SMALL ITEM VICE & NUTCRACKER
This is another item I used to supplement my income during the 1980s and provided some intrinsic value. I also enjoyed my hobby which kept me off the streets LOL.
Based on a Macadamia nut cracker BONK (and not wanting to breach copyright), I changed the unit by using thicker and narrower f.m. steel, smaller diameter bolt, countersunk the base to hold the nut (later BONKs employed this I think). I also angled the top to about 80 deg and painted with red killrust which I later overpainted with flat black water based paint due to popular demand. Also I did not employ the rubber caps on the handle ends and instead slightly rounded over the handle winders' ends.
When I first saw the Bonk, I immediately saw the usefullness as a small parts clamp or mobile vice for welding and glueing. Friends saw them and wanted one. When they asked what I called it = "its a RUNC". "What?" -"Ran's Unoriginal Nut Cracker and clamp".
The one pictured was a "reject" due to daggy welding= strong but ugly, and so, after remaking another reject, I found the time taken was much the same as making a new one so kept 2 for my own use eg cramping small bits and bobs. I had other prototype designs including ones with different sized washers attached on the base (to hold the nut steady) but drilling with a 5/8" or 3/4" bit formed the best dibbit to hold Macdamias, brazil nuts, wallnuts, etc & didn't interfere with holding small parts.
The only tools I used was a vice for holding the flat for drilling & bending & welding, some leverage tube (for bending the flat), a grinder & a stick welder with rods, chipper, wire brush etc.
Shown here only with some of my latest crop of nuts.
Attachment 30023 Attachment 30024
Hope this easy peasy unit inspires some.
