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Worst Vise Repair Ever ...

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gatewaysysop

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Nov 11, 2008
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Some of you may want to avert your eyes on this one, especially if you've just eaten. I am not joking when I say that this literally made me cringe when I first saw it. After that I just wanted to puke. :puke:

That someone could do this to a nice Reed is just sickening. Put the poor thing out of its misery if you can't fix it properly. Dear God... what the hell were they thinking? :wtf:

I love the quote in the listing on eBay, by the way. It reads in part:

Vice has been repaired years ago.
Has been welded at the jaw area and the repairs have held up,and it seem to have made it bigger and maybe better.

...

In very good working shape.
Click to expand...

Bigger and maybe better huh? Just... wow. :confused:

What a waste.
 

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7

7th Kahuna

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The first injustice was the repair, the second was the paint job. Why bother, or why not just hit it with some bush on house paint. It would have evened out the welds a bit.
 
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Bikes&Bowties

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Jul 1, 2011
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Washington
Okay I mean I realize it was a nice vice and the repair is a bunch of birdshit. But that vise still works like it was intended to? Id mount it somewhere I didn't have one. I guess I'm 18 and more into using it than collecting it
 
A

alfazer

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Nov 1, 2011
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N. Ireland
But that vise could tell a story. Maybe someone on a farm, miles from anywhere, struggling to get by, and no time or money to buy a new one.

Improvise, adapt, overcome.
 
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thesilverone

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Jan 25, 2008
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Taxachusetts
Bikes&Bowties said:
Okay I mean I realize it was a nice vice and the repair is a bunch of birdshit. But that vise still works like it was intended to? Id mount it somewhere I didn't have one. I guess I'm 18 and more into using it than collecting it
Click to expand...

Its a hack job. Its not about collecting, its about doing a proper repair job.
 
L

Larwyn

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Oct 10, 2011
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Texas
There's absolutely nothing wrong with trying to squeeze the last bit of use out of a vise, or any other tool for that matter. That ugly repair allowed someone to continue to use the vise which makes it 100% more useful than simply throwing it in the dumpster. Maybe it is not a showpiece, but it is a vise.

The whole idea that all tools need to be beautiful just does not register with me. I would use that vise without a second thought. But then I'm more interested in the final outcome of a project than having a showplace workshop in an effort to impress others.
 
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Burgerkong

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Larwyn said:
There's absolutely nothing wrong with trying to squeeze the last bit of use out of a vise, or any other tool for that matter. That ugly repair allowed someone to continue to use the vise which makes it 100% more useful than simply throwing it in the dumpster. Maybe it is not a showpiece, but it is a vise.

The whole idea that all tools need to be beautiful just does not register with me. I would use that vise without a second thought. But then I'm more interested in the final outcome of a project than having a showplace workshop in an effort to impress others.
Click to expand...

I'd say it was abused, look at the handle, that's probably why the jaw snapped off. Any repairs won't be as strong as an original casting, it's just waiting to fall off once any sort of pressure is put on the jaw.
 
B

Bull

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Aesthetics aside: the last time I saw the vise on eBay, it was something like $100 or more IIRC. That's a lot of money for a vise that had that much damage.

Since none of us performed the repairs, we can't have much faith in their quality.

For the original user, sure, it might have been something to keep them truckin' in times of need. But as an item for sale on the marketplace, that thing *****.
 
T

TreePointer

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Oct 25, 2011
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PA
That vise actually may have come full circle. The abuse and repair is so rough that it's possible to attain shelf queen status. :lol:
 
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Burgerkong

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Jamesbbh said:
If no one has ever broken a vise, you haven't been using them hard enough.
Click to expand...

So if yo-u haven't broken anything, you haven't been using it hard enough? What entails 'using it hard' and getting a job completed? If using a vise to press a tight bearing breaks it, it's simply because you didn't have a press handy, ie the wrong tool for the job.
 
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Mstrfxit12

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OK to me, its a damn vise. You make do with what you have, if you break it, and can put it back together again and make do some more, perfect. I dont advocate beating on equipment but if you need a press and you dont have one or access to one and the vise jaws will open far enought o do what you have to, game on. A little extra grease on the screw and a cheater on the handle if necessary and off ya go.
Oh and I liked the line about it being a precision piece of equipment. I dont beat on my precision multimeter with a hammer but my precision vise has certainly taken a few licks.....
 
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4x4gearhead

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Mstrfxit12 said:
OK to me, its a damn vise. You make do with what you have, if you break it, and can put it back together again and make do some more, perfect. I dont advocate beating on equipment but if you need a press and you dont have one or access to one and the vise jaws will open far enought o do what you have to, game on. A little extra grease on the screw and a cheater on the handle if necessary and off ya go.
Oh and I liked the line about it being a precision piece of equipment. I dont beat on my precision multimeter with a hammer but my precision vise has certainly taken a few licks.....
Click to expand...

Couldnt agree more, kind of silly to be up on a high horse about a vise, dont get me wrong I like a good vise, but to say its a precision instrument is just stretching it a little bit. I also agree with Bull that $100 for this vise is a bit much.
 
R

rusty65

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The weld repair made it so you could at least use it as a very light duty vise or as a good doorstop.
 
W

wildhorsehans

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May 24, 2012
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Chester NH
Relax, it's a vise. All it does is hold something that you are going to cut, drill, weld, bend, or beat the snot out of. Heck most of them are bolted to the back bumpers of service trucks, hardly a place you normally find precision anything.
 
S

SuDZ

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Jan 21, 2008
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Massachusetts
it could have also been someone new to a welder and not really sure what they were doing, but fixed it none the less.
 
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transittech

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Feb 27, 2012
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299
I was going to say, yah, its ugly but it works so who cares, UNTIL I saw the other post and looked at the EBAY pics. BOTH rear corners of the dynamic slide are broken, the handle is bent, the swivel has been replaced, and the top has been repaired. Time to part the poor thing out. (Maybe this thing has been pieced together of dead parts from other vises???)

As posted in the other thread:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/320919019907#ht_562wt_956
 
P

premierplayer

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Jan 30, 2010
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Maryland, USA
Survivor for sure. Some peeps don't go for show piece repairs, working and useable fits their needs. BIN $89 I can't do, for the same or less I bought a new, USA, Ace with lifetime warranty for my workplace earlier this Summer.
 
C

Carla

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Nov 27, 2010
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Back during the war, creative or improvised repairs were a necessity.

Most, if not all, shops worked three shifts on the war effort, and new tools or tooling were often simply not available, depending on the level of 'priority' the War Production Board had assigned to your particular shop. Even with a good priority level, getting a new vise could be 30 to 90 days out.

Its all too easy to imagine a new unskilled assembly helper breaking the vise, and the shop foreman giving the wreck to a welder, saying 'break off the job you're doing now, and do what you can do fix that broken vise, as quickly as you can'.

The welder found some bits of scrap steel, and did a 'quick fix' which, apparently, was 'good enough' for the purpose, at the time.

('the war', to people of my age, is always understood to mean the 1939-45 war.....I was only a small child, myself, then, it was my parents' generation who were 'in the war'.)

That vise is now rather obviously worthless, as a tool, but as a possible souvenir of 'war-time ingenuity', it is an interesting little bit of history.

cheers

Carla
 
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Rory Bellows

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I can't believe someone tried to sell it for $89. I have a 5" Wilton bullet on CL for $110 and am getting no interest at all. Some people are crooks. I do agree that that vise is not a precision tool even if unbroken. Reed vises have alot of slop in the leadscrew. A Wilton Bullet on the other hand is very much a precision tool with little to no slop.
 
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Shadowdog500

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Down the shore
I know who had that vise before.

primitivepete.jpg


Sorry for the blurry image, best one I could find.
 
9

91bronc300

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Oct 19, 2009
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Rory Bellows said:
I can't believe someone tried to sell it for $89. I have a 5" Wilton bullet on CL for $110 and am getting no interest at all. Some people are crooks. I do agree that that vise is not a precision tool even if unbroken. Reed vises have alot of slop in the leadscrew. A Wilton Bullet on the other hand is very much a precision tool with little to no slop.
Click to expand...

Too bad you're in Ohio. I want a bullet but they never show up on my local CL. Some come up in Chicago, but I'm not driving that far for a vise.

I don't think the repairs on that vise make it any less valid as a vise. I mean really, 'create clamping force' that's its whole job. It doesn't have to be gorgeous. I don't think that vise has any sell value though.
 
OP
G

gatewaysysop

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I'm astonished but strangely not surprised that there are folks who would defend that monstrosity of what was once a very nice Reed vise. Then again, this the GJ after all, and some people will defend just about anything. :lol:

It's all good though, different strokes for different folks I guess, and to each his own. :thumbup:

Regarding the other thread on the same vise (which I didn't see before), it's rather amusing to note that nobody defended it in that thread. Must have been an off day. :lol_hitti
 
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