Does anyone have a suggestion for a good way to clean this?
For smaller vises, I have soaked them in a crockpot filled with undiluted Simple Green and then cooked them for a few hours. The old paint just lets go and can easily be washed off under running water or in my case, outside with a relatively low pressure electric pressure washer.
On larger vises I have had some success with warming up the vise and then spraying liberally with EZ Off oven cleaner. Then pressure wash. The advantage of the hot soak in SG is that it also cleans the vise nut and all the inside surfaces. I use those techniques on the cast iron parts…not the handle, screw, and nose.
In most parts of the country, right now you don’t need a crock pot. A dark colored metal bucket full of SG out in direct sun will get warm enough. For several years now, I have been considering building a big insulated box painted black inside and covered with a salvaged double pane window. Put that out in the sun and you’ll get hot solution pretty quickly.
Next time I see a cooler beside the road that fell out of a pickup or ?? I might just grab it for my project.
