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I Forge Iron

A few quick vise handle questions


Mark Ling

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I have a vice that I'm working on, and one of the things is that the handle is bent and rusted thin were it was bent that when ever you use it, it re-bends at that spot. I am planning o re-forging a handle for the leg vice, and didn't know if it would be beneficial to make it out of a spring steel (I have a coil spring that I straightened out)? I would leave it un-heat treated. also, the wedges that keep the mounting bracket on were mushroomed, and so I took them to the grinder to remove it, and they appeared (doing a spark test) to be a medium carbon, or high carbon steel, is it necessary in the future to forge them out of a high carbon steel, or mild steel? thanks guys!

                                                                                                                                        Littleblacksmith

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Thanks Frosty and C-1 ToolSteel!

Had some time today and forged a new handle for the leg vice (is there a proper term for that?). It was forged from 3/4 round mild steel, to a little over 1/2" round. On one end I forged a ball (it was the first ball that I had ever forged, they're actually kinda fun!) and the other one is riveted on to a tennon. The vice that I am making this for had a bent leg that I also straightened out.

                                                                                                                            Littleblacksmith

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IMG_5218[1].JPG

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6 hours ago, arftist said:

Nice work but I think it will bend in use.

Try spring steel for the handle.

Thanks, that's what I thought at first, but then was told by two people not to, and so went and forged it. If I'm unhappy with it that I will make a new one. This is very much learning experience for me, and so we will see how it works!

                                                                                                                                          Littleblacksmith

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If you have to tighten a part using a cheater bar (or with a few whacks of a hammer on the handle), you've likely got bigger issues going on---such as trying to hold something round in flat jaws not designed for holding round things.

Address the actual problem of clamping rather than by trying to cover it up with excess pressure.  Figure out a different clamping scheme, for instance--or make a quickie set of extra jaws to hold the part properly.  That handle failure is a feature, not a bug.  Best not to cover it up with stiffer material or you'll pay in impossible-to-fix failures elsewhere.

Yea, I know...in the real world we all get lazy and try to use the Q & D solution of cheaters or giving the vice handle a few taps of the hammer.  Do as I say, not as I do :)  

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Can't agree with Artist; I currently own a dozen postvises and had several dozen more go through my hands and many of them had soft handles. I figured it was so you would stop before you messed up the screw/screwbox which is a big problem to fix compared to straightening a handle.  Just like when you sew a seam the thread is supposed to give before the cloth does.

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I agree, they are designed to be tightened by hand. Using additonal force is likely to bind the screw threads causing gauling and more so if the handle does not give under excesive pressure. A softer handle that does become deformed is much easier to repair initially without permanant damage or replace ultimately than a machined screw thread.

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The handle is the safety feature of the vise.

If the handle bends or fails in use, then the use is too much for the size and construction of vise. How many times have you seen someone pull out the old cheater bar instead of getting the proper tool in the first place. If you need that much pressure, then you need a larger vise, or as mentioned, a different gripping system.

 

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20 minutes ago, ThomasPowers said:

I was just thinking that putting in a "fail point"   that was fairly easy to repair used to be fairly common in equipment; but nowadays we are more likely to replace an item than repair it.

There is some very weird psychology that goes on around this subject.  If, on the commercial equipment we build we put in shear pins--the customer gets grumpy that the shear pin breaks and blames the existence of a shear pin for lost production.  Similar happens when a specific part fails:  Instead of seeking the cause for failure they go immediately to the notion that the part was defective and ignore that it is 99.999% more likely that something else went wrong and the failed part is a symptom.  I guess it's akin to people who put a penny in place of the old Edison screw in fuses when they blew.

I've never really figured out how to redirect thinking toward looking at the issue rather than the specific part problem.  I guess its just one of those human nature mysteries that won't be solved.  In a holistic view, a part failure can be a good thing and lead you to solving the bigger problem...if you decide to look over the rim of the box.

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On 10/31/2016 at 9:23 PM, C-1ToolSteel said:

If you can't bend it with your hands, how are you going to bend it without a cheater bar?

I can easily bend it by hand but I am on the big side.

I see your point though.

Honestly I didn't read the entire thread and thought it was a bench vise.

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On 2016-11-01 at 10:29 PM, Kozzy said:

There is some very weird psychology that goes on around this subject.  If, on the commercial equipment we build we put in shear pins--the customer gets grumpy that the shear pin breaks and blames the existence of a shear pin for lost production.  Similar happens when a specific part fails:  Instead of seeking the cause for failure they go immediately to the notion that the part was defective and ignore that it is 99.999% more likely that something else went wrong and the failed part is a symptom.  I guess it's akin to people who put a penny in place of the old Edison screw in fuses when they blew.

 

Also If the customer is too stupid or lazy to handle the equipment right he is likely to blame the equipment for his own shortcomings and replace with something very inferior that he understands without thinking. Dont ask me how I know:angry:

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23 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

In general I assume that no customer will do "regular maintenance" on *anything* and so for them I try to design stuff that doesn't require it---like using stainless steel or monel for things made to be near water..

This is a battle I have almost daily with outside engineers.  I design our stuff so that it is able to operate 10 years down the road after poor maintenance and a lot of wear.  The engineers are constantly pointing at what the book says the numbers should be:  Stuff like "But the friction factor of UHMW polyethylene is .15 here in this book".  Yea, brand new and squeaky-clean but not with 10 years of starch and dirt buildup plus a few hunks missing from the inevitable machine breakdowns over time.

I got in a big battle once over chain rollers--book said that chain rollers rolling had some low rolling friction factor.  I dragged the engineer out to the machine and showed him that every single roller was locked up from years of gunk and they were sliding, not rolling.  His response: "But the book says..."  He threw me out rather than be proven misguided (to be polite) in his thinking.

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On 11/2/2016 at 8:29 AM, Kozzy said:

There is some very weird psychology that goes on around this subject.  If, on the commercial equipment we build we put in shear pins--the customer gets grumpy that the shear pin breaks and blames the existence of a shear pin for lost production.  Similar happens when a specific part fails:  Instead of seeking the cause for failure they go immediately to the notion that the part was defective and ignore that it is 99.999% more likely that something else went wrong and the failed part is a symptom.  I guess it's akin to people who put a penny in place of the old Edison screw in fuses when they blew.

I've never really figured out how to redirect thinking toward looking at the issue rather than the specific part problem.  I guess its just one of those human nature mysteries that won't be solved.  In a holistic view, a part failure can be a good thing and lead you to solving the bigger problem...if you decide to look over the rim of the box.

Ha ha, reminds me when in another life I worked as an electrician and the owner of a nightclub who blew the fuses regularly due to overloading his very basic wiring, asked me to replace the fuses with thicker ones "so that the short goes out to the street" ... loved it ever since. 

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The handle sizes were correct for the size vise when new..     A leg vise is a tool like any other and they do wear.. I tighten the vise for what ever the job requires.. But on that same token a 4" vise will not sustain the same force as an 8" vise.. 

But as for saving wear and tear on the screw threads the more load applied the great the pressure gets distributed to the rest of the threads..  You will usually find on fulled screwed boxes that the first few threads take a beating and then the rest are in better shape.. Lots of the vises have brazed in threads from coiled wire.. While it works very well it's not as accurate as machined and even the machined (tapped) boxes will show similar wear.. 

A really good vise will have a threaded box that is more than 2" in length..   A cheaper vise sometimes will only have a few threads in the box.. 

If you ever notice the threads on most vises are worn where they get used the most, yet the vise fully opens and closes.. 

Anyhow, Because the jaws on smaller vises are usually narrower the amount of pressure per square inch is more focused vs a thicker jaw of a wider vise.. 

Anyhow,  in 38 years I have never found the need for a cheater pipe to hold something being forged. I have seen many a bent handle..   In all the the vises I have if the handle is bent and there is slop in the hole I install the next size rod that will fit in the hole without modification of the screw boss where the handle goes thru.. 

I'm also no light weight and on a regular basis on my 5" and up vises clamp the vise down with full body weight on the handle.. I will also once tight give the handle a kick with the foot/boot if I need to in a fast time frame.. 

Proper oiling or greasing will lead to a much longer life span even with heavy use..   When was the last time anybody cleaned and lubed the threads and box on their vise????? 

 

Nice job on the handle..   if there was extra room I would have upsized the handle..  Spring steel is a bad idea.. but cold rolled is a good idea.. Lots of the handles were made from mild steel even in the olden days.. Wrought iron bent way to easily.. 

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dont know how to get rid of this...

Anyways, Thank you everyone! I have not used this vice yet, as I am planning on putting it on a work bench that I'm going to have towards the back of my shop. I also find that Leg vices do an excellent job of holding just about anything, and haven't ever needed a cheater bar! Occasionally I will hand tighten it to the point were I can hardly untighten it, and then I'm like "wow, was that me who tightened that?!".

                                                                                                                           Littleblacksmith

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