Recent content by PierceA

The Pierce Motor Company used various maker's tools through the years. Those tool rolls look like ones from a teen's Pierce or possibly an early '20's car. All the teens cars had 'T' head engines, one intake and one exhaust valve on opposite sides of the cylinder bore. Then halfway through...

Fishwatcher: A few suggestions; find a short piece of rigid copper tubing, maybe a female-female coupler. A short piece of tubing can be slit lengthwise then opened up to have an ID of 7/8", slide it over the mainscrew. A 3/4" coupler may already have an ID of close to 7/8". Last idea...

Tom Graham: I corrected some memory errors in my first reply above.. Regarding finding dates of manufacture for Parker vises, well, it's difficult at best. Only a few vise manufacturers date stamped their vises. It is assumed for warrantee purposes. Reed, Wilton, and a few others had...

Tom Graham: I will have to go out to the shop and sort through the vise-pile. But from what I recall: The A or B suffix came along after the Union Acquisition. The Union-made 'Parker' vises usually had a slightly different casting shape than the Parker-made vises.. Particularly, the...

BeerHippie: I too have a Chinese rotator vise like your's, Mine has 6" jaws and works very well. I beat on it, grind on it, and weld on it.. I have many other great American vises, but don't want o abuse them like I abuse this Chinese vise. my biggest complaint is that it only opens 6". which...

Another additional method for getting a swivel jaw to break free: Again, put some object in the vise, off-center and clamp it down tight. Then put the entire vise in a BBQ and heat it over several hours.. 3-400* will start to have an effect on the rust-chrystalization. Wearing gloves of...

11b30B4: A method I use to get the rear swivel jaw to swivel: Once the pin is removed, put an object in the vise jaws offset to the side. This will put force on the swivel jaw to try swivel to clamp the offset item.. Then use a brass hammer or a chunk of hardwood and a hammer against the rear...

I repair this type of crack from the underside. I unscrew the dynmic completely, then clean the crack thoroughly from the top and bottom. I blow out the crack with compressed air. I then clamp the slide in another vise, in the normal upright position. I look to see that the crack will close...

Strandberg: I think the very faint date-stamp [they all are very faint] appears to be 119 or maybe 110_. I have seen Reed date stamps have no zero for 01-19, so your 119 could be january of 19. Or it could be 11-0_, so November of 0_. could be 08, 09, There should be matching numbers on the...

For the purpose of balancing: Typically some metal is removed with a mill from the inside of the piston, usually from the underside of the crown of the piston.. Each piston would then be weighed individually, free from the vise. A blacksmith? I agree, who knows. But the tool catalogs...

Outlawmws: I have seen a similar vise that was being used to clamp and hold a piston for an engine. The leather jaws prevented or reduced damage to the ring lands on the pistons. I think it was used on a drill press or a mill to hold the piston for removing a small amount of metal from the...

Brazing or welding, I'd probably weld it. I have had excellent success with welding most of the cast iron vises and parts. Especially on smaller parts, preheating and slow post welding cooling with stress relieving the weld.. It works.. Brazing would be my second choice. To me the first...

I have had 'R' model Reed vises that were painted with a thin, black low gloss paint. But I think the majority of the 'R' model Reeds I. have or have had were grey. The latest Reed vises, the one's with the 'oval Reed' badge all have been grey, those that I have acquired. The Reed R series...

MadeByMiller: yep, even scooting and sliding a heavy vise from the bucket onto it's next resting place can be a lot of work! As mentioned above, unscrew the dynamic all the way, and this roughly splits the weight in half.. Not that half of 260# is that 'light'. But it does make moving it...

AntiqueBen: there are several threads on freeing up a stuck swivel jaw locating pin. And of course freeing up the swivel jaw. I'll mention a few cautions: The tapered locating pin can be stuck in the fixed base, or in the swivel jaw, or in both. There are several methods to push the pin out...