Very nice, I would of never believe how bad of shape it was "before" if you didn't post the pic of it.
I "Rescued" a Chas Parker 954 the other night for $20 bucks. It was a nice tight functioning vise BUT..... The front of the tightening screw where the handle goes looked like chewed up bubble gum. So I figured I would try to bring this beast back up to par with what I called a "Nose Job" LOL. So here's how it turned out....
First I cut off the bent up handle. You could then see how badly "Chewed Up" it was in the close up. I then took it to my friends machine shop. I threw it on the lathe and tried to get at least 75 to 80% clean up before welding it up. I wanted to keep as much original meat as I could. You can see what it looked like after welding and final machining. Then the mock install on the painted vise. I think it turned out pretty good. Let me know what you guys think. This was just something I did because I have a lot of free time on my hands and had the resources to do it. I usually try to find better condition vises, but this one was in really nice condition OTHER than this one flaw
who knows at this point lol... It's now a BULL again
I think that slide was replaced with some channel!
Here's a made in the USA Craftsman that my dad has on his workbench at home. After all these years he finally decided enough was enough and it was time to clean things up. He took everything off so he could repaint the workbench and he brought his vise to me so I could "restore" it since he knew I enjoyed that kind of stuff...
Mostly just coated in surface rust, crud caked in the jaws, and some paint overspray. For some reason the locking handle had a ton of rust on it while the main screw handle wasn't too bad.
I took it all apart and use the wire wheel on the bench grinder to clean off around the jaw areas and all the small parts. I also deburred the main screw nut since it has some burrs stuck to the ends where they cut the threads.
I polished the anvil area, then taped up everything I wanted to leave bare metal. Sandblasted it... Gave it 2-3 coats of Rustolium Sunrise Red (had on hand). Let dry overnight and reassembled this morning. Gave it a good oiling & grease where needed. Looks brand new used.
Last summer I cleaned out my grandfathers business, got a lot of great (and expensive) tools. He ran a forensic mechanical & electrical engineering company.
Took this nice Columbian 43 1/2 off of an old bench, didn't clean it off until today, nice straight main handle, but the swivel adjusting handle was bent pretty bad. Managed to take it off and get it almost perfectly straight. Not bad for a free vise!
Before taking it apart and re-assembling it I noticed that the front jaw, when not fully closed can move back and forth about 1/4" and when tightening or loosening the vise jaws, the jaws themselves don't move until the handle is turned about 1 1/2 times. I took some pictures of inside where the retaining washer rides in the groove at the start of the shaft, and when I push in the main shaft from the front, this is how much room I have behind that washer:
When the vise is open, and I push the jaw towards the body while holding the handle (not turning it), this is how much of a gap I have by the handle:
It doesn't really bother me that much, just wondering if this is how it would normally be.
Also picked this up from the cleanout last year as well, a small PanaVise with hard rubber jaws, no model number on it, the jaws are about 2 1/2" wide and it stands about 7" tall. Pretty awesome for small detail work.
