# It's my birthday and can't decide what to get



## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

Hi all,
It's my birthday this month and I have been going back and forth on what I should buy for my birthday.   I just can't seem to make a decision.  Kind of narrowed down to some micrometers, a 0 to 1" and a 1" to 2", or an 8" rotary table.  Do I buy cheap chinese off fleabay or look for older American made.  I have recently seen some nice Starrett and Brown & Sharpe micrometers at some very reasonable prices on CL  The rotary tables I have seen on CL look to be well used.  For information my mill/drill's table is 8.5" x 28.5" to the outside edges of the table.  Or should I look for a decent milling vise.  Swivel base, fixed base, should it also tilt.   On the rotary table I would definitely want both vertical and horizontal.  What about a tilt function on the rotary table.  So many choices I can't make a decision.  Help me out.


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## RandyM (Mar 22, 2018)

I think you deserve it and get them all.


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## bluechips (Mar 22, 2018)

sounds like you need more birthdays...


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## cg285 (Mar 22, 2018)

bluechips said:


> sounds like you need more birthdays...



the problem is everyone only gets just one birthday


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## Uglydog (Mar 22, 2018)

Go with the RT.
Consider one which will accept index plates, a tailstock can also be helpful.
While not critical it will open opportunity in the future. 
If you are mounting on an import machine, then an import RT is fine.
Hand mics can be picked up anywhere at much less money.

Daryl
MN


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## Bill Gruby (Mar 22, 2018)

cg285 said:


> the problem is everyone only gets just one birthday




 Marines get two birthdays.  LOL  Get them all.

 "Billy G"


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## Richard King 2 (Mar 22, 2018)

Happy Birthday    Now everyone start humming the birthday song...

If it were me I would skip the tools and get a massage or fly to someplace warm and hangout on the beach baking away my aches and pains I seem to be getting the older I get....LOL


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## shooter123456 (Mar 22, 2018)

cg285 said:


> the problem is everyone only gets just one birthday



False, I have had 22 of them so far.


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## Richard King 2 (Mar 22, 2018)

Or spend the day at the shooting range, that's always fun making noise  
There is an online auction up here with all sorts of tools ending today, you can get a lot of  American made "fun stuff" on there too...


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## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

Well I have my own 50 yard range on my property and I spent 7 years cruising south of the border on my sailboat so I'll cross those two off.   I might go back to Mexico some day.  Life was easy and the living was good down there.  Cheap too.   And my mom is turning 100 this August so I hope to have a few more birthdays to come.
I am seeing hand micrometers in the $15 to $25 range on CL.  I'll check fleabay again.  Rotary tables are all over the map on price.  I don't have an immediate need for anything right now but know that I will need them in the future.
I know Brown & Sharpe and Starrett make good mic's.  What about Sears Craftsman mic's?  Other good brands?  Brands to avoid?
Same on rotary tables.  What brands should I look for?  Avoid?  And what features should I look for.  I can see a use for a pointer that I can move like you can adjust the dial on a lathe.  A tailstock would be good also.  Are they table specific or is any 8" tailstock compatible with any 8" rotary table?  What about work holding options?  What should I look for?
Decisions, decisions.  Help me out.


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## Suzuki4evr (Mar 22, 2018)

mickri said:


> Hi all,
> It's my birthday this month and I have been going back and forth on what I should buy for my birthday.   I just can't seem to make a decision.  Kind of narrowed down to some micrometers, a 0 to 1" and a 1" to 2", or an 8" rotary table.  Do I buy cheap chinese off fleabay or look for older American made.  I have recently seen some nice Starrett and Brown & Sharpe micrometers at some very reasonable prices on CL  The rotary tables I have seen on CL look to be well used.  For information my mill/drill's table is 8.5" x 28.5" to the outside edges of the table.  Or should I look for a decent milling vise.  Swivel base, fixed base, should it also tilt.   On the rotary table I would definitely want both vertical and horizontal.  What about a tilt function on the rotary table.  So many choices I can't make a decision.  Help me out.


E V E R Y T H I N G!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

I don't know about everything.  I have some friends where the wife controls the purse strings.  She tells her husband that he can buy anything that he wants to but he can't buy everything.  No wife here to keep me inline.  Just 3 persona's.  Me, myself and I that constantly argue back and forth about everything.


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## cg285 (Mar 22, 2018)

bluechips said:


> sounds like you need more birthdays...



the problem is everyone only gets just one birthday 


shooter123456 said:


> False, I have had 22 of them so far.



hmmm, your driver's license has that many different dates on it?


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## Suzuki4evr (Mar 22, 2018)

What about the rotary table with dividing plates. I have a mill/drill and a swivel tilting vice,but the vice takes a lot of z-axis up. I am going to sell this one and get a smaller tilting vice and are fixing another machine vice. My point is,if you want a tilting vice,look for a smaller tipe not a big one like I have.
	

		
			
		

		
	



Too big


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## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

Suzuki4evr
Thanks for the advice about a small tilting vise verses a larger one.  One of my up coming projects is to modify the steering wheel hub from my 66 midget to adapt it to an aftermarket steering wheel.  A swivel vice might work for this project but not for others that are on the back burner right now.  Still a good machinist vise would be good to have.  What I have right now is HF junk.  Really just a drill press vise and of questionable quality.


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## cg285 (Mar 22, 2018)

if the op is including a 1" mic in his list then i assume he doesn't have one -sooo a mic vs a rotary table??


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## mikey (Mar 22, 2018)

Personally, and at least for this one birthday, I would spring for a good vise for your milling machine. It is the foundation for most of your work on the mill. A rotary table is fine and a tilting angle table is good, too, but they are not used anywhere near as often as a milling vise. A cheap angle block set will get your angled work done unless it is too big for the vise and a cheap square and hex block (5C or ER collet) set will handle simple indexing jobs; both of these things require ... a vise.

Buy a really good vise and it will serve you well, and you can keep it for use on a new mill if you change up.


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## dlane (Mar 22, 2018)

I Don’t use my micrometers much “dial calipers mostly “for what I do.  I have a tilting swivel heavy machine vice and a vertex 8” h,v rotary table both are rarely used.
By far the Kurt 6” mill vice is used the most , I have a swivel base somewhere for it is rarely never used.
Ied go for a good machine vice if yours is HF junk.


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## cg285 (Mar 22, 2018)

mikey said:


> Personally, and at least for this one birthday, I would spring for a good vise for your milling machine. It is the foundation for most of your work on the mill. A rotary table is fine and a tilting angle table is good, too, but they are not used anywhere near as often as a milling vise. A cheap angle block set will get your angled work done unless it is too big for the vise and a cheap square and hex block (5C or ER collet) set will handle simple indexing jobs; both of these things require ... a vise.
> 
> Buy a really good vise and it will serve you well, and you can keep it for use on a new mill if you change up.



yeah but when he is done he can't measure what he did haha


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## mikey (Mar 22, 2018)

cg285 said:


> yeah but when he is done he can't measure what he did haha



True 'dat! But he can't do much to measure without a good vise - I would go for the chicken and get the egg later.


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## cg285 (Mar 22, 2018)

mikey said:


> True 'dat! But he can't do much to measure without a good vise - I would go for the chicken and get the egg later.



not sure how to answer that. i guess he could just eyeball everything going in and out  - wait a minute - that's more towards fabricating where a tape measure and a big chinese vise works


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## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

Looks like a forum member is going to set me up with the mic's.  So I am deciding between the milling vise or a rotary table.  I am leaning towards a milling vise with a swivel base and maybe tilt for right now.  If I went for the rotary table I would want a tailstock and dividing plates which gets me into some serious $$. 
My mill is a mill/drill and not a true mill.  I doubt that I would ever buy a real mill.  The table is only 8.5" wide and I would want the vise to sit on the table without hanging over the edges.  I'll look for some milling vises and post examples of ones I like.


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## cg285 (Mar 22, 2018)

you really don't have a use for a rotary table. start with the basics


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## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

You are right cg285.  I really don't need a rotary table right now.   And might never need one to tell the truth.
It has been a cold, rainy day today.  2.5" so far and more to come  Had to go to town this morning in pouring rain.  50 mile round trip.  Spent the afternoon looking online at rotary tables, mic's and machining vises.  I am tired.
 Suzuki4evr above posted about not getting to big of a vise for a mill/drill.  Good advice I think because I have a mill/drill and probably will never move up to a real mill.  In looking at true machinist vises they seem to come in two sizes.  Small and large.  Didn't really find anything in the middle.  Was looking at the Grizz catalog and came across some heavy duty drill press vises.  I know.  Groans and more groans.  But they seem to be about the right size for my mill/drill.  Here are the links.
http://www.grizzly.com/products/Quick-Release-Drill-Press-Vise-6-/G5761  and
http://www.grizzly.com/products/Quick-Release-Drill-Press-Vise-4-/G5760 
I like the depth of the jaws.  One problem I have found with my junk vises is the small less than 1" depth of jaw.  Hard to hold stuff at times.  The size is right.  What do you think?


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## mikey (Mar 22, 2018)

I have a "mill/drill", an RF-31, with a 4" Kurt on it. Works good. You seem to think that a mill/drill is not a real mill and maybe its not but at about 500# mine does a good imitation of one. Which machine do you have and are you sure you want to put a drill press vise on your machine?


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## dlane (Mar 22, 2018)

Drill press vices are for drilling not machining + the quick release won’t hold for machining and not ridgid or accurate enough for machining. They do work ok on the drill press if well made. Haven’t seen a mill vice that didn’t hang off the front of the table some.


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## mickri (Mar 22, 2018)

Scratch those off the list.  That is the kind of feedback I am looking for.


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## dlane (Mar 23, 2018)

There are other mill vices out there that I hear are pretty good , you might try searching mill vice , there has been conversations here on them , I’ve only dealt with Kurt there kinda pricey though


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## mickri (Mar 23, 2018)

There is a 4" kurt for sale for $200 on CL about 125 miles from me.   250 mile round trip.  And there is kurt knock off for sale for $150 not far from where my son lives in So Cal.   No idea what condition they are in.  What should I look for when looking at one of these?


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## mikey (Mar 23, 2018)

Look for any cracks, make sure the jaws close evenly across their entire width and be sure there are no big holes drilled into the bed. Any of these would be a deal breaker for me. The paint can be re-done but the vise should basically be in good overall condition.


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## Tozguy (Mar 23, 2018)

mickri said:


> I don't know about everything.  I have some friends where the wife controls the purse strings.  She tells her husband that he can buy anything that he wants to but he can't buy everything.  No wife here to keep me inline.  Just 3 persona's.  Me, myself and I that constantly argue back and forth about everything.



I must be lucky, my wife does not count my tools and I do not count her shoes.

Anyways mickri you have us, none of us pout but we will keep you in line somehow.

So for now Happy Birthday!


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## cg285 (Mar 23, 2018)

do you have what it takes to tram in the vise?


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## dlane (Mar 23, 2018)

What Mikey said , + I bought this Palmgren swivel tilting 6” vice off CL $ 200.  I used cigarette paper to check that jaws closed properly the length of them it is in good shape and my Kurt soft jaws fit it . 
Now to find a way to get it up on the table easily 



I took off the swivel base until needed for ridgidity. 
This one would hang off your table quite a bit .


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## mickri (Mar 23, 2018)

Yes I can tram a vise.
Been looking at vises.  Here are two more from Grizz.  http://www.grizzly.com/products/Premium-Milling-Vise-4-/G7156 and http://www.grizzly.com/products/Precision-Self-Centering-Vise/H7576  The 2nd one is self centering.  Is this a useful feature or just a gimmick?
Here is one from Precision Mathews.  http://www.precisionmatthews.com/shop/vise-4-highprec/
Anybody have any experience with these vises?


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## mickri (Mar 25, 2018)

Would like to thank everybody for their advice and suggestions.  I have also spent a lot of time reading a lot of the vise threads on the forum.  And I have come to a decision.  I am going to get a 4" machinists vise with a swivel base.  Deciding between either the Grizz vise or the Precision Mathews vise that I posted above.  I know that I will not use the swivel base much if at all but lots of folks on here said it was handy to have when you needed it.  Vises over 4" just don't seem to fit on my size mill/drill.
I will keep checking CL to see if anything comes up close to me.  Won't hold my breath on that.  I live out in the country and nothing is close to me.  It just doesn't pay to make a 70 mile round trip to Visalia or a 100 mile round trip to Fresno to look at something.
Thanks again for all of the advise and suggestions.


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## dlane (Mar 25, 2018)

I’ed go for the Precision Mathews , I know nothing about them but they sound good to me, price is not bad ether.
PM seems to have good customer service if anything is not rite.
Don’t think ied like the self centering one


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## mickri (Mar 25, 2018)

The self centering kind of sounded like a gimmick to me.  Interesting but only saw them on the grizz website.  I found out about Precision Mathews from comments on this site about what a good company they were to deal with.  So I found there website and looked at their vises.  I got a shipping quote of $40 to my door.  $160 total cost.  I doubt that I will find anything better in that price range.


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## COMachinist (Mar 25, 2018)

I will though this out. I got my self one for my 47th anniversary last month, of coarse this was after I got SWMBO a nice peral and diamond ring. lLambrich 1/2” keyless 33J mounted on tts stub. LOL man is it nice a 10th Total Runout.
CH


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## mickri (Apr 21, 2018)

My birthday presents have arrived.  First I got 0-1, 1-2 and  2-3 micrometers from forum member UglydogLLC.  Thanks again Daryl.  Then I went shopping for a 4" machinists vise with a swivel base.  Shars had them on sale at about 40% off retail.  Shar's shipping was significantly higher however it was still the best price I could find.




The reason I wanted the swivel base was not to use with the vise but to use with this chuck base that came with my lathe.




I bored a hole for the pin on the swivel base and drilled two holes for the hold down bolts and nuts.




and mounted it on the swivel base.




All of my chucks and backing plates can now be mounted on the swivel base   This gives me a crude rotary table that will be suitable for a couple of projects on my to do list.  I will add a vernier scale which will give me accuracy to 1/10 of a degree.


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## Boswell (Apr 21, 2018)

mickri said:


> This gives me a crude rotary table that will be suitable for a couple of projects on my to do list. I will add a vernier scale which will give me accuracy to 1/10 of a degree.



Very clever


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