MadModder
Gallery, Projects and General => Gallery => Topic started by: AdeV on February 18, 2012, 03:57:03 PM
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Once upon at least ten years ago, a rather large - and sadly broken - vice was stored under a bench. It only revealed itself when we moved out of the old big shed. Since Dad had
stolen scored all the benches with vices on, I grabbed at this, despite the sad lack of 1 jaw.
Mounted proudly on my bench, it proved to be almost entirely useless. So - I decided to fix it. I also decided to use aluminium for the jaws - this will probably be a mistake, but it's easier to work with than steel and I happen to have rather a lot of it...
First job was to remove the one remaining jaw. Many many years of use and abuse, plus clearly being stored in a puddle at some point, meant the screws were stuck fast. So I spent a very happy hour belting them with a great big impact driver :hammer: One screw sheared, the other - almost unbelievably, undid! Still, 1 out of 4 ain't going to cut the mustard, so the screw was binned.
Next, I mounted the fixed portion up on the mill and cleaned up the surfaces:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-01.jpg)
You can see the left-hand screw hole is clear & the right-hand one is blocked. Rather than try to re-use the clear hole, I decided to re-drill & tap both to M10:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-02.jpg)
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-03.jpg)
The holes were exactly four and a bit inches apart...
The next job was to find a lump of aluminium. Here's my trusty Manchester Rapidor carving a piece off:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-04.jpg)
Half an hour later, the block was ready to be squared off, drilled and counterbored, then screwed onto the vice:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-05.jpg)
Then it had it's head cut off :) Following a bit of tidying up:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-06.jpg)
Now the moving jaw was put on the mill (in the vice, ironically: A vice within a vice... is that too many vices?). As you can see, it was in a bad way:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-07.jpg)
After a good clean-up, new holes were drilled & tapped. I ignored the old holes as there was so much erosion at the top of the jaw, they didn't look like they'd be strong enough.
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-08.jpg)
Anyhow, the other half of the ali block was now drilled, counterbored, and screwed on. After a bit of tidying up to make everything square, here's the vice in all it's new glory:
(http://www.lister-engine.com/pics/vice/Vice-09.jpg)
Finally, some machining work at my actual level of ability: Square blocks! :lol:
The jaws are quite fat, so I can re-skim the faces if they take damage. At least, that's my story, and I'm darned well sticking to it!
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Nice to see a old tool reused
At least the jaw prorectors cant fall off :D :D :D
John
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Nice job AdeV. Ralph
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Bad luck...you'll be reluctant to use it now! Lovely patient job, I expect someone in the future will extend the same respect to the red tool chest!
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Great job, satisfying hey?
Nick
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That vice looks like a car dealer showing off all his chomppers!
PekkaNF
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Thanks chaps, it was certainly nice to be able to actually grip something in the vice & not have it fall out, or fly across the room, etc. Plus I should be able to hold soft stuff without marring it, never thought of that bonus of using aluminium.
Pekka - I think I'm going to call the vice Jaws, after the James Bond villain:
(http://images1.makefive.com/images/entertainment/movies/best-james-bond-bad-guys/jaws-7.jpg)
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All I can say to this Ade is.... "great minds...."
(http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll221/dividedhead/Other%20older%20projects/Aluminium%20vise%20jaws/DSC00249.jpg)
:nrocks: :thumbup:
Ralph.