# Shars mill vise



## coronetracer (Feb 14, 2013)

I'm looking at buying a Shars lockdown mill vise from Discount Tool . Does anyone have one of these vises and can you give me some input , ie pros and cons ? Thank you and happy machining ! Ebert


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## coronetracer (Feb 17, 2013)




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## GaryK (Feb 17, 2013)

I am in the market for a vise also. I looks at the shars just due to the price.

What turns me off from buying one and others like it, is that is has a regular 60° type of thread on the leadscrew.
Not much material for a thread and compared to a vise with a acme thread, looks like it would wear out faster.
I actually purchased a Grizzly vise because they told me it had an acme thread, but it didn't, so it's going back.

Enco has yet to tell me if their vises have one because they don't want to open the box to look.

Matt at Precision Matthews says his Homge vises have an acme so I will be getting their 5" vise. They are made
in Taiwan rather than China.

Gary


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## xalky (Feb 17, 2013)

This might not help much, but I've bought a lot of things from Shars, a lathe chuck, boring head, indexable milling cutters and an axa toolpost, to name a few. I've been happy with the quality in all cases.  For my home shop it gets the job done without breaking the bank.


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## coronetracer (Feb 18, 2013)

GaryK said:


> I am in the market for a vise also. I looks at the shars just due to the price.
> 
> What turns me off from buying one and others like it, is that is has a regular 60° type of thread on the leadscrew.
> Not much material for a thread and compared to a vise with a acme thread, looks like it would wear out faster.
> ...


Thanks Gary K and that is exactly what I was concerned about was the clamping screw being a V thread and I agree with you !


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## Terrywerm (Feb 18, 2013)

GaryK said:


> I am in the market for a vise also. I looks at the shars just due to the price.
> 
> What turns me off from buying one and others like it, is that is has a regular 60° type of thread on the leadscrew.
> Not much material for a thread and compared to a vise with a acme thread, looks like it would wear out faster.
> ...



I always thought that the Shars vises were a little too low in cost. Made me ask "why?"     Now the answer is becoming apparent. The Homge vises on the other hand are cheaper than a Kurt, but reasonable in my book.  Let us know about your Homge purchase, Gary.  It should prove interesting.

I've currently got a small vise on my Clausing 8520, it is an original Clausing vise and seems to be okay, but I would like to get a modern lock-down vise as it would give quite a few advantages. Additionally I would rather spend a little extra money to get a better item rather than spend the least and end up with something that I am not happy with.


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## GaryK (Feb 18, 2013)

terrywerm said:


> I always thought that the Shars vises were a little too low in cost. Made me ask "why?"     Now the answer is becoming apparent. The Homge vises on the other hand are cheaper than a Kurt, but reasonable in my book.  Let us know about your Homge purchase, Gary.  It should prove interesting.
> 
> I've currently got a small vise on my Clausing 8520, it is an original Clausing vise and seems to be okay, but I would like to get a modern lock-down vise as it would give quite a few advantages. Additionally I would rather spend a little extra money to get a better item rather than spend the least and end up with something that I am not happy with.



Here's a picture of the grizzly if you're interested.




And the Shars.


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## Terrywerm (Feb 18, 2013)

I agree with the others that ACME thread would really be the way to go on something like this. Looks like we can scratch Grizzly from the list.  Somebody recently mentioned purchasing a Vertex vise. I will have to see if I can find it and determine what sort of thread it had. I believe it also had regular 60 degree threads, but I will have to find out for sure.

ON EDIT:  Yup, the Vertex also uses a 60 degree thread as I first thought. I also tried to find out about Phase II milling vises, but they are hard to find and they do not offer a 5" model which is what I would be looking for. 4" is just a shade too small, 6" is a shade too big.  Can't win!


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## TDHofstetter (Feb 20, 2013)

I own one of those Shars lockdown vises. Don't worry too much about the 60* threads - keep a little oil on 'em & they'll go for the rest of your life. Being high-tpi threads, though, you won't want to use nearly as much elbow grease when you tighten the vise as you would with a low-tpi Acme screw.

The one complaint I have with mine is... it doesn't lock down very well; the moving jaw STILL rises, and I STILL have to tap down my workpiece. It's not as bad as a "non-lockdown" vise, but it's not NEARLY as good as a Kurt (I've used one). That said, I may tear into mine one of these days to find out why the moving jaw rises - it's possible there's just a rough surface on the two wedge faces... or maybe it's a ball-type and the ball's wrecked. MAYBE they just sold me a non-lockdown vise but advertised it as a lockdown type - I'll know for sure one of these days. If it was designed to be a real lockdown, I'll make it work RIGHT. Till then, I'll keep using a little toolmaker's vise (guaranteed lockdown) clamped in the bigger vise's jaws - the little one tapped down - for smaller work... and I'll keep tapping down my larger workpieces.


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## jjtgrinder (Feb 22, 2013)

terrywerm said:


> I agree with the others that ACME thread would really be the way to go on something like this. Looks like we can scratch Grizzly from the list.  Somebody recently mentioned purchasing a Vertex vise. I will have to see if I can find it and determine what sort of thread it had. I believe it also had regular 60 degree threads, but I will have to find out for sure.
> 
> ON EDIT:  Yup, the Vertex also uses a 60 degree thread as I first thought. I also tried to find out about Phase II milling vises, but they are hard to find and they do not offer a 5" model which is what I would be looking for. 4" is just a shade too small, 6" is a shade too big.  Can't win!


******************
Here is a photo of the Vertex 4" vise screw.  It is (IMHO) well made and the threads are very well machined.


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