Free 186 More Best Homemade Tools eBook:  
Get tool plans

User Tag List

Results 1 to 4 of 4

Thread: Wilton Vise Balls or Any Vise Balls

  1. #1
    Supporting Member jjr2001's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2016
    Posts
    915
    Thanks
    1,182
    Thanked 2,071 Times in 554 Posts

    jjr2001's Tools

    Wilton Vise Balls or Any Vise Balls

    My vise needed some balls for holding non parallel pieces. I saw this somewhere on the net along with using copper wire or aluminum wire at the moveable jaw to allow clamping to a flat side when dealing with rough parts.
    Both work but I keep loosing my wire! Any how, since I just finished my tool and cutter universal grinder I thought I would try it out.

    Chucked up the 1" ball bearing in a 5C collet, mounted that on the grinder table and went to work. Here is the result. The flat is visible on the ball on top of the piece of brass.

    Cheers, JR
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Wilton Vise Balls or Any Vise Balls-dscf0009.jpg   Wilton Vise Balls or Any Vise Balls-dscf0010.jpg  

    186 More Best Homemade Tools eBook

  2. The Following 3 Users Say Thank You to jjr2001 For This Useful Post:

    Jon (Aug 31, 2016), Paul Jones (Aug 31, 2016), PJs (Aug 31, 2016)

  3. #2
    Supporting Member Paul Jones's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Del Mar, California
    Posts
    1,231
    Thanks
    5,810
    Thanked 1,459 Times in 657 Posts

    Paul Jones's Tools
    JR,

    I often wondered if a universal tool grinder would work for holding the ball bearing for grinding. There is a YouTube channel by Chuck Bommarito and I think these were for sale as "Screwyballs" on eBay. Looks like an interesting project with the right tooling in the shop. You could even chuck the 5C collet in the lathe and perhaps use a QCTP tool post grinder to grind off an edge? Great job!

    Thanks, Paul

    2,000+ Tool Plans
    Last edited by Paul Jones; Aug 31, 2016 at 04:51 PM.

  4. #3
    Content Editor
    Supporting Member
    DIYer's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2013
    Posts
    3,055
    Thanks
    792
    Thanked 1,880 Times in 1,677 Posts


    Thanks jjr2001! We've added your Vise Balls to our Vises category,
    as well as to your builder page: jjr2001's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:




  5. #4
    Supporting Member jjr2001's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2016
    Posts
    915
    Thanks
    1,182
    Thanked 2,071 Times in 554 Posts

    jjr2001's Tools
    Hi Paul,
    I just used a square 5c collet holder with the stop installed to keep the ball in the collet with about 40% of the ball exposed.
    Just clamped that to an angle block and proceeded to grind. My grinder is not that powerful so I saved 70% of the time on the second one by using my belt sander first (ball chucked up in the 5C with stop) and just finished it on my "universal" grinder.
    Much faster.

    Cheers, John



    2,000+ Tool Plans

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Tags for this Thread

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •