Sdflcorran
Member
Going to post pictures as I progress on my first vise restore.
This first post will basically mirror my post on the big Vises of GJ thread.
After buying a house last year I decided that I needed an old vise that I could restore. About 3 days into seriously looking I missed out on a $25 Simplex by an hour or two because I was helping someone move and didn't see the ad in time.
Couple days after that, I noticed a Craftsman on Craigslist.
After a little digging here I realized it's a long "C" 5185 made by Reed that matches the description of the 1945 model on Outlawmws's Craftsman catalog post.
I bugged the seller for almost a week before he agreed to meet. After confirming the cast jaws weren't destroyed I practically flung the $35 he was asking for it at him (I think at that point he realized a mistake on his part, but I had the post on my phone to prove it).
Lot of bug guts and grime. The slide has not been mistreated too badly, but was definitely deformed - the last 1/4 was a bear to pull out.
Everything came off easily but the vise nut and the lead screw. My "shop" is mostly made up of a mini B&D home kit from when I got married. Not really equipped for larger projects - which is the whole point of this vise.
I played around with a pick and got a small square nut to come out of the vise nut cavity. I have no idea how it got in there while the dynamic jaw was installed but figured it had deformed the front edge of the vise nut and that's why it wasn't coming out. I lined up some scrap wood and gave it a few "quiet" (since the kids were asleep) taps from a hammer. That pushed it out and confirmed my suspicions that the square nut had gotten caught between the static jaw and the vise nut which caused the deformation. I hit it with a file until it went in and out smoothly.
Here the only thing left to disassemble was the lead screw. Note the blue tint to the static jaw.
I couldn't figure out how to take out the lead screw. After looking at the base again and realizing it was a Reed, I spent about 40 minutes trying to find someone clearly describing the split nut removal (found it somewhere on GJ). The dynamic jaw got set vertically and I wrapped a WD-40 soaked paper towel around the bulb so that it could soak in around the split nut.
At this point my lack of proper tools and **** retentive detail oriented self had probably put 4-5 hours into the vise.
This first post will basically mirror my post on the big Vises of GJ thread.
After buying a house last year I decided that I needed an old vise that I could restore. About 3 days into seriously looking I missed out on a $25 Simplex by an hour or two because I was helping someone move and didn't see the ad in time.
Couple days after that, I noticed a Craftsman on Craigslist.
After a little digging here I realized it's a long "C" 5185 made by Reed that matches the description of the 1945 model on Outlawmws's Craftsman catalog post.
I bugged the seller for almost a week before he agreed to meet. After confirming the cast jaws weren't destroyed I practically flung the $35 he was asking for it at him (I think at that point he realized a mistake on his part, but I had the post on my phone to prove it).
Lot of bug guts and grime. The slide has not been mistreated too badly, but was definitely deformed - the last 1/4 was a bear to pull out.
Everything came off easily but the vise nut and the lead screw. My "shop" is mostly made up of a mini B&D home kit from when I got married. Not really equipped for larger projects - which is the whole point of this vise.
I played around with a pick and got a small square nut to come out of the vise nut cavity. I have no idea how it got in there while the dynamic jaw was installed but figured it had deformed the front edge of the vise nut and that's why it wasn't coming out. I lined up some scrap wood and gave it a few "quiet" (since the kids were asleep) taps from a hammer. That pushed it out and confirmed my suspicions that the square nut had gotten caught between the static jaw and the vise nut which caused the deformation. I hit it with a file until it went in and out smoothly.
Here the only thing left to disassemble was the lead screw. Note the blue tint to the static jaw.
I couldn't figure out how to take out the lead screw. After looking at the base again and realizing it was a Reed, I spent about 40 minutes trying to find someone clearly describing the split nut removal (found it somewhere on GJ). The dynamic jaw got set vertically and I wrapped a WD-40 soaked paper towel around the bulb so that it could soak in around the split nut.
At this point my lack of proper tools and **** retentive detail oriented self had probably put 4-5 hours into the vise.
