June 20, 20188 yr So I bought an old 5.5" post vice. The old girl was totally rusted together and needed a bunch of incentive to get it apart. I have it about 90% cleaned up and noticed that where the nut mechanism for the clamping screw is keyed to the through hole is kind of stripped out. The key is worn and needs to be built back up for one thing and the sides of the hole need to be built back up about 1/8 inch so that it will properly engage. If this was a forged steel vice I wouldn't have a problem welding it. I am very concerned that this is a wrought vice though. If it is, can I build these areas back up by either MIG welding or stick welding? I'm pretty sure I can build the key up no problem. The keyway is the part that has me concerned. Any advice?
June 20, 20188 yr Well folks have been arc welding wrought iron for close to 100 years now so it can be done. Can you do it? I don't know. Expect to need more filler as the ferrous silicates will tend to go away. It's low carbon so no difficulty with pre/postheat.
June 20, 20188 yr Author Thomas, Thanks for that. I was just not sure you could weld wrought iron and end up with any strength left in the material. Thanks for the information. I will weld it up with some 7018 and file it to the right dimensions.
June 20, 20188 yr Wrought Iron; Its Manufacture, Characteristics and Applications; James Story, Edward B. Aston; has some discussion on arc welding it---including a picture of them welding up the trash bars for a dam. (Not enough info to make it worth buying for that though.)
June 30, 20188 yr Your mileage may vary, but welding wrought didn't go well for me without a bit of preheat. It was sort of foamy sounding/looking while traveling, and full of porosity after. Preheat seemed to take care of it. I used metal core wire roughly equal to 7018. Mind, that was anvil body wrought iron on an older mousehole (pre-pritchel) style anvil, and I feel like I read/heard somewhere that some wrought anvil bodies were generally pretty low grade stuff... Edit: The other issue I ran into was travel speed. I ran too fast initially, which probably meant I wasn't getting full melting and mixing of the slag inclusions within the wrought iron. Hence, porosity
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