WWII Bench Vise, Desmond Stephan w/Property Tags

G-ManBart

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Wayne State University recently had an auction to get rid of excess machinery and tools from their engineering and machinery school (not sure what they call it). Mostly it was getting rid of old manual stuff since CNC, lasers, etc is what's being taught these days. I bought a lot that had four workbenches, one of which was pretty old with a cast iron base and a tag that suggest it was from the 1950s at the latest. On that table was a Desmond Stephan Manufacturing Co Simplex 41P vise (4.25" wide jaws). Desmond Stephan vises have largely been under-rated, or at least under-appreciated. The vise line was eventually sold to the Ridge Tool company and ultimately most folks know them as the Ridgid line of vises, which were known to be pretty solidly built.

Anyway, back to this vise...it was filthy! I saw it had a couple of property tags, but couldn't read them so I gave it just a quick touch with a toothbrush and some solvent. The one tag is smaller and shows it as property of Wayne University, which was the name used from 1933 to 1956. The larger tag is from the Defense Plant Corporation which was a U.S. government entity that essentially funded companies between 1940 and 1945 as part of the war effort. DPC ceased operation in July of 1945. Also, the tag shows it was part of the Flying Boat Division, of Nash-Kelvinator (Nash car company). Nash-Kelvinator made aircraft engines, propellors, binoculars and other items for the war-effort and were awarded a contract to build Vought-Sikorsky VS-44 flying boats, but it was cancelled when other flying boats became available in sufficient numbers. My guess is they started to tool up a plant, this vise was part of that, the program got cancelled and then the stuff was surplussed after the war and purchased by the university. Anyway, here's a few pictures of a neat piece of U.S. history...roughly 80 year old vise that still works perfectly. I've got more vises than I know what to do with, so if you're local and interested in it, shoot me a PM.

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very, very cool. cool vise and the flying boat Div. connection is priceless.
 
That is really awesome. Congrats on a great score!
 
Cool history. Were the benches decent? Mike
 
Cool history. Were the benches decent? Mike
They were definitely nice. They had the four benches as one lot, which probably kept most folks from bidding on them. I had already won the Sheldon No. 0 horizontal mill from the auction, so I was already going to be pulling a trailer there and that made it easy to bid on the benches.

Two were six foot long with thick butcher block tops and back shelfs. One of those had a really nice Wilton 400S mounted on it. One was a 5 foot butcher block top and then there was the cast iron base bench with this vise. I really only wanted the cast iron base bench to turn into a table, but had to buy all four. I cleaned up the Wilton which was super nice, and listed it on Facebook, along with the three butcher block benches. The Wilton sold within a few days, and the guy buying it saw this Simplex vise and just had to have it (he's a fellow machinist who likes vintage tools). I've got more vises than I need so I was okay selling it since the fun was just in finding it and making sure it's back in use.

The butcher block tables all sold within less than a week. Selling the vises and the three tables paid for the bench I kept and most of the Sheldon mill for good measure!

The cast iron base has a makeshift top on it, so I'm going to make/buy a nice top for it and strip/paint the base to match some furniture in our house. I just loved the design of the base and when I brought it home my wife immediately agreed it needs to be made into something cool and unique.

The Wilton clearly wasn't used much. I took it apart, cleaned, lubed and reassembled. The only thing I've done to the Sheldon is light cleaning and throwing an import 4" vise on it....definitely not used much as the table is perfect and everything is tight like a new machine with truly minimal backlash, etc. It could use a couple of new drive belts from sitting static for years, but that's it.
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