Found cheap leg vise. Worth buying?

[notownkid]

I have found over Many years if it looks good, this seems to,  something you want or need, got the money in your pocket, buy it before some one else does.  You get it home don't like it for some reason put it back on the market with a 100% markup, settle for a little less and keep looking. 

As we were told in the Army "He who Hesitates is Lost".    

[Frosty]

The first picture is from when the Trewax was only maybe 10 years old on the Soderfors it's the one on the left. I took this pic just after I got the Trenton home, the large one on the right. The little one is the rail anvil I made years before I scored my Soderfors. 

The second pic is the Sodorfors on the steel tripod stand I built to make it easier to move and damp the extremely loud ring. It looks really weathered but the Trewax is still going strong, Condensation is extreme in my shop in the spring if snow is bad there's even water on the floor. Using it has shined it up and gone a long way to cleaning the rusty off the black carnuba. It's still getting close to needing refinishing. The Trenton has a steel tripod stand now for the same reasons as the Soderfors, I'll probably paint it my shop colors. Maybe paint them both to match.

Frosty The Lucky.

[HumanAfterAll]

13 hours ago, notownkid said:

. As we were told in the Army "He who Hesitates is Lost".    

Note taken. Thanks!

Frosty,

How many years are the photos apart?

And maybe I missed something, but isn't it the Trenton on the green tripod?

Edited May 17, 2020 by Mod30
Trim quote & remove @tag

[Frosty]

DANG, you're right! That is the Trenton when it's stand was new!  I must've been half asleep when I attached those pics. Every time my computer updates the software it scrambles things, I have to search to find pictures and sometimes entire files get displaced.  I literally just came in from the shop and that is definitely NOT the Soderfors on the tripod in this pic. I can NOT believe I was that asleep.

The spruce block stand under the Soderfors was rotting from the bottom, you can see bits of rotted wood on the floor around it, it got a tripod first. That pic had to have been from around 2007 when the shop was new. I mortised the Soderfors into the spruce block in 1980-81.  I trewaxed it in the mid late 70s right after getting it. 

The best I can piece together in my dented head, the Soderfors had been wearing the Treewax you see in the pic about 27-30 years at that time.

I'll have to search  my files when I'm more rested, I have more current pics.

Frosty The Lucky.

 

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

12 hours ago, notownkid said:

He who Hesitates is Lost"

Or as my late FINL said "If you snooze, you lose."

[HumanAfterAll]

27 minutes ago, Frosty said:

I'll have to search  my files when I'm more rested, I have more current pics.

That's quite alright. Thanks for sharing and please, do get some rest! =)

Oh, the vice is really greasy. All over it. You know, when grease is old enough to not function as grease but still steins everything around it? Should I remove it before wire brushing it?

Also, if you need any sort of help with computers, feel free reach out. I work all day long with them!

21 minutes ago, Irondragon Forge & Clay said:

Or as my late FINL said "If you snooze, you lose."

I tried looking for the definition of FINL and got some interesting results, which I believe are wrong: 

 

Cheers all!

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

OOPS... threw in an N, must be tired like Frosty... FIL Father In Law.

[Marc1]

Finding on Internet Not Likely ...

[Frosty]

1 hour ago, HumanAfterAll said:

Oh, the vice is really greasy. All over it. You know, when grease is old enough to not function as grease but still steins everything around it? Should I remove it before wire brushing it?

That kind of grease is the norm for old blacksmithing equipment. Both the vises I bought worked pretty well but the screw and box were caked pretty solid with old grease. I loosened it by soaking it a couple days with regular applications of spray degreaser. Then I took them to the car wash and took the high pressure hot water spray to them.  

I don't know if you'd have to clean out the old grease but if you take a power brush to something greasy it will sling old grease on everything. 

Frosty The Lucky.

[Donal Harris]

It is redundant to say, but Frosty is certainly right about the dangers associated with using a powered wire brush. When cleaning my vice after bringing it home I ended up wishing I had been wearing a leather apron. Those bristles may as well been needles as easily as they buried themselves in my abdomen and thighs.  If you go without PPE normally, you will not want to do so when using a wire cup brush. 
 

The worst part happened after I had been using the brush for an hour or so. I got careless and caught my left hand with the brush when it kicked back. That hurt so badly I couldn’t look at my hand for a bit. I was sure I was going to see a broken, mangled mess. 

[Marc1]

Use a polisher not a grinder for steel brushing. The speed is too high and the brush disintegrates. 

[pnut]

I use my drill with a cup brush. Nice and slow and your completely out of the plane of rotation.  

Pnut

[HumanAfterAll]

13 hours ago, Frosty said:

I don't know if you'd have to clean out the old grease but if you take a power brush to something greasy it will sling old grease on everything. 

I brushed it a little bit with the cup brush and it seems like I do not need to clean it before. Thanks!

3 hours ago, Marc1 said:

Use a polisher not a grinder for steel brushing. The speed is too high and the brush disintegrates. 

I don't own one, unfortunately. I'll go with a cup for my drill, like @pnut. Thanks for the advice, though.

 

[Frosty]

4 hours ago, Marc1 said:

Use a polisher not a grinder for steel brushing. The speed is too high and the brush disintegrates. 

This is would be a good reason not  to use cheap, dollar / closeout store wire brushes. I've been using wire brushes, cup and straight, in right angle disk grinders 4 1/2" to 9" for 50 years and while they all throw bristles I've never seen nor heard of one "disintegrating." Except this one "warning".

They ARE extremely dangerous yes, no question but this kind of linear extrapolation doesn't help. When people discover wire brushes don't disintegrate they're more likely to disregard legitimate warnings. 

Frosty The Lucky.

[Glenn]

No matter what the source, a powered wire brush REQUIRES PPE.  Heavy clothes, heavy or leather aprons, hearing protection, eye protection, safety glasses AND full face shield, etc.etc.  They put a lot of dust and debris into the air so breathing PPE needs to be considered.

You should position the brush so it always runs OFF the metal being brushed.  

[pnut]

I agree absolutely with the two above posts. PPE is a MUST no matter what motor you have a wire wheel or cup attached to. 

Pnut

[Donal Harris]

I can’t remember the site. They have a safety section with exactly two posts in it if I recall correctly. One is by a guy who is talking about the dangers of this sort of thing. He even posted photos of the bruises to his head and face that resulted when the piece he was working on was grabbed by the brush and wrapped around his head. He lost months of forging time due to the accident. 
 

The second post in the section was written posthumously about him after he tried to burn the zinc off galvanized pipe by placing it in his forge. He was very experienced and no one is completely sure why he tried to do something like that inside his shop. 
 

I didn’t intend to hijack this thread with safety stuff, but it is a very, very important thing. Even more so perhaps because most or at least many of us do not have a background in manufacturing or fabrication.

As for the OP, very good find. The screw not being original doesn’t make it any less cool, especially at the price you paid. Those who have said a vice is the most important piece of equipment are right, which I expect you have discovered yourself by now if you have mounted and begun to use it. 

[SLAG]

D. H.,

The guy that you are alluding to was, Jim Wilson.

An old friend.

SLAG.

[Glenn]

Jim pawpaw Wilson from NC was the fellow that tangled with a open, unguarded wire wheel.  It was  mounted on a metal shelf outside the door to his shop. One side of the motor had a wire wheel attached, completely exposed, and positioned beyond the edge of the shelf.  No guards at all.  Jim was polishing a foot long piece of 1/4 inch square metal hook that was bent to 90 degrees for lifting the lid on a cooking pot. 

The wire wheel grabbed the hook, jerked it out of his hand, took it between the wheel and the wall, around and over the top of the wire wheel, and threw it back into his face. It struck him diagonally across the bridge of his nose and his eyebrow breaking his safety glasses.   This caused him fall against a 5 gallon bucket full of concrete he used as a weight to hold up the his tarp shelter as an outside roof.

Lots of stitches, and two concussions, one from the hook, and one from the bucket of concrete, and a new pair of safety glasses.

I have used that wire wheel !!  I remember it looked dangerous at the time, like it wanted to grab onto something. Jim said it is an open wheel, just be careful and do not push or hog it.  He tangled with it about 6 months or a year later.

 

I have had table mounted wire wheels grab onto metal and suck it between the wheel and guard, sometimes stalling the motor.  The guard / rest was set properly close to the wheel surface and it still grabbed the metal and sucked it in.

With a hand held wheel, you MUST remember to run the wheel surface OFF the metal.  This way the wheel brushed the metal and then moves OFF into a safe area where it has nothing to grab against.  If you brush on to the metal, the wheel WILL grab if given the opportunity. 

This lesson resulted in the scar that I have on my right hand.  I have carried that reminder to run the wheel OFF the metal since I was a teenager. 

Bottom line is wire wheels will bite.  It is not an option, it is the rule.   

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

I had never met Jim Paw-Paw Wilson but followed his teachings and articles. What a loss to the Blacksmith community.

[Glenn]

 

Zinc, galvanized, and coatings was started partly because of Jim Wilson and his run in with galvanized coatings.

Jim PPW Wilson shop and Working with Zinc or galvanized was written to actually show what Jim's set up looked like warn against the dangers of zinc. 

 

[Marc1]

6 hours ago, Frosty said:

This is would be a good reason not  to use cheap, dollar / closeout store wire brushes. I've been using wire brushes, cup and straight, in right angle disk grinders 4 1/2" to 9" for 50 years and while they all throw bristles I've never seen nor heard of one "disintegrating." Except this one "warning".

They ARE extremely dangerous yes, no question but this kind of linear extrapolation doesn't help. When people discover wire brushes don't disintegrate they're more likely to disregard legitimate warnings. 

The fact that many use cheap or expensive, straight or twist wire brushes, on angle grinders that go 10k rpm or more, for a year or 50, does not make it good practice. Wire brushes disintegrate ( lose strength or cohesion and gradually fail.) due to the excessive speed of this tools, and the bristles become dangerous missiles. 

Best practice is using a good quality cup twist wire wheel, on a D handle 6" polisher that does 3 to 5k rpm, and has a variable speed to match. The brush will last a bit longer but most importantly will not spew bristles at high speed. 6 or 7" polishers are cheap and the job is done safer and better at about the same speed. 

Angle grinders are just about the most abused and misused tools in the shed, due to their rock bottom price and vast practical uses. A friend of mine used a 4" grinder with a 4" circular saw attached and no guard to prune bushes. Did this for years too, until the inevitable ... 3 fingers lost, but kept his face after extensive surgery. Things we do. 

 

[HumanAfterAll]

I've soaked the thing in soap water and got myself a face shield after reading all this. 

Didn't think powered wired brushes were so dangerous.

I'll keep using a hand wire brush for now, while the face shield is on its way. 

Thanks a lot, guys. You've probably avoided an accident here. 

Cheers all! 

[pnut]

1 hour ago, HumanAfterAll said:

Didn't think powered wired brushes were so dangerous.

A guy I used to work for plugged one in and didn't realize it was turned on. It ran up his pants leg doing some damage underneath. That's an extreme example but I give angle grinders the respect they deserve. I only use them if there's no equal alternative. 

Pnut

[Marc1]

I use them all the time, but I only buy rat tail, soft start, paddle switch ( dead man switch) 5", for metal work.

Always use face shield over safety goggles despite some friends and colleagues calling it "overkill". Nothing like peer pressure to drop your guard on safety. It's like those who tailgate you whilst you drive to get you to go faster. Flip your rear vision mirror up and ignore them. Personal protection is personal and you are the only one that will suffer from the lack of it.

3 hours ago, HumanAfterAll said:

I've soaked the thing in soap water and got myself a face shield after reading all this. 

HAA ... what did you soak in soap water? Your grinder?