arkie

I prefer a heavy oil for the screw lube. Grease tends to attract and hold scale and krud which may cause early wear on the screw. If you are outside in a sandy, dusty locale, the grease can get gummed up pretty quickly. But then if you don't use the vise a lot it may be a mute point. Just keep it well lubed.

All the best wishes to you and Deb, Frosty.

Wow, beautiful work. I get dizzy just looking at them. Must have been fun forming all those!

If you are going to forge in your garage, get any gasoline out of there and put it outside somewhere.

The screw box is the split cylindrical part in your first three pictures between the two vise halves. As in the pics, the large screw simply moves back and forth inside it. It's one piece. The thread is usually an Acme-type thread and mates the box, so the ID and OD you mentioned depends on whether you measure the outside or inside of the screw threads. For the best results, try to find parts from a non-working post vise that will let you use the replacement screw box that will fit your screw. Putting a tube inside the split screw box won't work with your existing vise screw. Pretty simple.

Wheels are a must. BIG wheels are even better...makes moving it around much easier. I found a picture somewhere that a guy had used a pair of old steel wheelbarrow wheels on his forge...looked kool. Make a drop-down handle of some design on the other end and you can move it with ease. No need then for smaller wheels on the other two legs. I've always liked DSW's forge. Really nice work there.

You might be able to forge a collar to wrap around the cracked screw box. You could then tack weld the collar to the screw box so it wouldn't open any more. It might look like Fido's b*tt, but it might work. I wouldn't try to weld the box crack. That piece will take a lot of stress. Best to see if you can find a replacement somewhere.

You'll be able to tell when the aurora show up directly overhead....

OK, so you WEREN'T napping....very good! Only on IFI can one transcend from a quench tank to magnetic anomalies and continental drift with a few puns thrown in for good measure...what a versatile forum!!!

The "drift" pun, or lack of it....like in drifting in open waters. Can't believe you missed getting a pun thread going!!! Must have caught you napping, Frosty!! Actually, it's interesting now that Google has bathymetry (sp?) in the oceans mapped. Go to Google Earth or Google maps and look offshore western U.S. You can see the ridges offset by shear/strike faults. You'll go blind trying to match them up, though. Same for the Atlantic. Pretty amazing stuff.

I don't get your drift (no pun intended...). According to Prof. Dill, who was intimately involved in the "project", that was the case with the magnetometers. It's my understanding that the nuclear subs are much quieter than the old WWII subs and the magnetometers were a new tool for detecting them.

Thomas, my being a (retired) geologist by profession as well, here is an interesting sidelight to the magnetometer discovery. Under the guise of oceanographic research, Naval Research Labs had been towing marine magnetometers up and down the offshore California coast. (Ref: Robert Dill who lectured one of our classes and had been a "consultant" to the NRL on the geology of their "zebra stripes" discoveries.) The real reason that the magnetometers were being used was research on the use of them to detect Russian subs that could/would hide in the numerous submarine canyons off the coast during the Cold War, being very close to land and otherwise undetectable. Dill, et. al. were significant researchers who contributed to the interpretation regarding sea floor spreading and mirror image records of same. The mirror image magnetic anomalies pretty well put the anti-continental drift advocates to bed.

Cruise on over to weldingweb...search Longevity. Be prepared for some bad news about them. Heed DSW's advise....'jus sayin'.

I don't use a surge protector for my inverter welder. I keep it unplugged (so I don't have to remember to do that) and plug it in when needing to weld; unplug when finished...just like turning off the lights. That doesn't cost any $$ either.

matto, if you have further interest in the Johnson soldering furnace, there's a recent thread over on the weldingweb with info on them. Search "soldering tower". The Johnson heaters are down the page several messages. I refrain from posting links to other forums in respect for Glenn and IFI.

Matto, I think the '56 Chevy might have been the one. I can't imagine anyone being stupid enough to straddle one of those!! (and, no one was drinking while hunting....)

It may have been similar to that...been about 57 years, so the shape is foggy :-) The model year was probably in the 50's.

Short story on hood ornaments....once in my younger days we were rabbit hunting in the country. One guy decided to position himself on the front of the hood on an old car that had a hood ornament in the form of an airplane. He was straddling the nose of the hood, feet on the front bumper. Someone yelled "rabbit!!!" The driver hit the brakes...you can picture what happened next. Fast trip to the ER to sew up his inner thighs and luckily he escaped with all his private parts.....

My all time favorite hood ornament is/was the bulldog on the hoods of Mack Trucks.

bigb, do you have access to another post vise that you can use to determine the geometry of the missing pieces? That may save you a lot of time and frustration. Lots of the vises have basically similar parts.

Thomas and Kozzy...well said!!!!!

I recently read, but now can't find it, where a principal officer with Hay Budden left the company and formed his own anvil manufacturing company, making "American Anvils". You might search for that info.

How flat do you want it to be? Not being a smart aleck here, but most flatters are flat so that no gap is seen when placed on a flat surface such as a table, etc. The edges do, however, need to have a radius to prevent leaving marks on your work.

For the time being, I cheated and bought what's called a "code stamp" from a tool supply company. It's a letter with a circle around it. Cost $16 and works for me. My problem is that I just can't seem to come up with a touchmark that I would like to use...brain lock, I guess. I can't justify spending $100 to $150 for a touchmark as has been quoted to me.

The stamp you are referring to is called a touchmark. You can make one or have one made to your design. The ready-made ones can become expensive. To make your own, obtain some higher carbon tool steel such as a section of coil spring, Allen wrench, broken drill bit, old chisels or punches, etc. Draw a design on a flat end and file, engrave or Dremel tool the relief. It doesn't need to be hardened/heat treated since it will be contacting hot steel that would probably negate any heat treatment.