Soft jaws bench vise

[PeterT]

Nothing mind blowing, just some sticks of aluminum to swap in my bench vise. I find I use 2 pieces of L angle aluminum pretty often so I don't mar work & they are perpetually slidng out of position or falling on the floor. So thought I'd make some jaws. I should have removed the stock steel ones first to look at the layout more carefully. The casting has ledge, the blind holes are very shallow. The flathead screws are Philips which is a wonderful choice if you have a 1.5" long screwdriver. I replaced them with hex bolts. I might make some smooth faced mild steel ones one day, or maybe with some features like Vee notches. Anyways was a good warm-up.

 

[John Conroy]

I think you'll like those. I made these for my large Yost vise and I almost never switch back to the steel jaws.

 

[PeterT]

Those are good ideas John. What is strip on the rear side? (over the small anvil-ish area that looks flush to the casting). Almost looks like you could screw on a jaw that would be higher than the casting & would give you increased width clamping ability like some of the milling vises? Unfortunately I don't have that feature. But if I did mine again maybe I would extend the top a bit. Its actually what I had intended until I realized the casting had a ledge. It has bigbejesus 1/4-20 flathead screws which are positioned quite low in the jaw.

My vise is a Record from Lee Valley 20 years ago, one of the early gen when they farmed out to Asia. The overall slide fit & lead screw is OK. Not awesome but better than some of the ones I've felt at stores. I wish I had a bigger vise & more metalworking orientated. Good ones cost a fortune & restoration prospects on Ebay are expensive to buy and to ship. Where did you get Yost?

 

[RobinHood]

Nice work guys; did my el cheapo vise some time ago - never took off the soft jaws since...



so true about the price of a real good bench vise. I will most likely go Jason‘s route (Fireball Tools): he built an astonishingly strong vise from tube and plate.

. Then in this video, he put a bunch of them to the test...

 

[Tom Kitta]

Have to make soft jaws for my vise as well.

 

[PeterT]

I saw that vise destruction Youtube Rudy. Made me cringe a bit the way he beat them. But did offer some insight.

I'm intrigued by the Brockhaus Heuer vise. They are Stefan endorsed.
https://www.jensputzier.com/brands/brockhaus-heuer/vises/

Personally I'd like a swivel style like attached pic but seems like either expensive or badly cloned

Some resto-inspiration if you ever find an oldy gathering rust

 

[John Conroy]

Those are good ideas John. What is strip on the rear side? (over the small anvil-ish area that looks flush to the casting). Almost looks like you could screw on a jaw that would be higher than the casting & would give you increased width clamping ability like some of the milling vises? Unfortunately I don't have that feature. But if I did mine again maybe I would extend the top a bit. Its actually what I had intended until I realized the casting had a ledge. It has bigbejesus 1/4-20 flathead screws which are positioned quite low in the jaw.

My vise is a Record from Lee Valley 20 years ago, one of the early gen when they farmed out to Asia. The overall slide fit & lead screw is OK. Not awesome but better than some of the ones I've felt at stores. I wish I had a bigger vise & more metalworking orientated. Good ones cost a fortune & restoration prospects on Ebay are expensive to buy and to ship. Where did you get Yost?

I got the Yost vise on Amazon, they don't list the 8" one anymore. It is reversible so the movable jaw can be installed from either direction giving 7" opening one way and 12" the other way. It has replaceable pipe jaws also. I saw the vise torture test video and it made me cringe, I would never beat on a vise like that but it was interesting. I have an old 5" Record clone that I use on my welding table, you can see the size difference in the pic. I paid about $300 for the Yost which I thought was not bad for an American made vise.

 

[RobinHood]

Nice looking vise that Brockhaus-Heuer. Look reasonably priced as well. Good find Peter.

oh yeah, saw that restoration video. Would be nice to have one of those vises. Gressel makes a modern version similar to the restored one.

 

[John Conroy]

When I bought my Yost vise they were still made in the States but their site now says made in China.
https://www.yostvises.com/8-multi-purpose-reversible-combination-vise-swivel-base.html