# Trash to Treasure?  Modifying a 3" Vise-shaped-object into a Shaper vise



## ErichKeane (Jun 11, 2020)

So, I have an Atlas 7B, as some of you may know, that didn't come with a Vise.  Shaper vises are stupid-expensive, at ~$350 for one filled with holes.

I built a 2 part vise from (mostly) scraps, which has been... "alright".  I get quite a bit of jaw lift on it that even putting a piece of wire in between the jaw and material doesn't fix completely.

SO, I decided to use my extensive tool collection to take this: https://www.ebay.com/itm/3-Milling-...d-With-360-Degree-Swiveling-Base/264266308467


A distinctly vise-shaped-object, that has about the right dimensions.  It is a little tall at nearly 3" and I have no idea how the bolt holes will line up.  PLUS, the reviews on these seem to be "don't buy this for anything requiring precision unless you have a surface grinder".  However, I _DO_ have one, so $60 for a big step ahead in the project seems like a good idea!  Plus, I really do like ang-loc type vises.


I plan on modifying this in a few ways. 

-I am hoping to get the total height under 2.25" if at all possible, which seems like a doable goal, closer to 2" if at all possible.

-Length wise, it seems a little long.  I might find myself removing a bunch of the surrounding casting on the mill in order to make it fit better on the table.

-I'll obviously surface grind it to the best of my ability to get it running flat and true.

-Deburr/desand-for-days.  I know these chinesium vises come filled with chinese sand and junk and goo.  I'll be removing as much as I can.

-Anything else you guys think would be a good idea!

So far, I've ordered the vise, and thats about it!  It should show up in about a week.


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## benmychree (Jun 11, 2020)

Your link does not work for me.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 11, 2020)

benmychree said:


> Your link does not work for me.


Woops!  Fixed!  Looks like I got a stray 'backspace' in there


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## Nutfarmer (Jun 11, 2020)

When you have the vice finished and mounted pictures please. Good luck


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## ErichKeane (Jun 11, 2020)

Nutfarmer said:


> When you have the vice finished and mounted pictures please. Good luck


Will do!  I intend to take pictures as I go along.  This might end up being a success, or just a waste of a $60 + shop time


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## JRaut (Jun 11, 2020)

Incredible that anyone is making any money on that thing.... $62.24 delivered to your doorstep..... yet they must be. There's gotta be at least 25 bits and pieces and fasteners to that thing, all of which are machined at least once, most more than that.

Crazy world (and not just because that vise is cheap...)


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## ErichKeane (Jun 11, 2020)

JRaut said:


> Incredible that anyone is making any money on that thing.... $62.24 delivered to your doorstep..... yet they must be. There's gotta be at least 25 bits and pieces and fasteners to that thing, all of which are machined at least once, most more than that.
> 
> Crazy world (and not just because that vise is cheap...)


Right?  I cannot even buy the cast iron used to make the vise for that much.  I priced out making my own vise at one point and couldn't get the materials this cheap.  I'm sure its junk chinese cast iron, but it SHOULD at least hold its shape, at least thats what I'm counting on


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## Hawkeye (Jun 11, 2020)

Most of that style of vise works fine with the swivel base removed. That would lower the vise and add to the rigidity.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 12, 2020)

Hawkeye said:


> Most of that style of vise works fine with the swivel base removed. That would lower the vise and add to the rigidity.


I definitely intend to use it that way most of the time, but I figure I'll try to reduce both the swivel height and overall height as much as seems reasonable.  The 7b does NOT have every much of a 'height' allowance, so any 1/8" I can steal will be valuable.  I might even thin out the top jaws as much as as reasonable to pick up a little.


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## ThinWoodsman (Jun 12, 2020)

As Hawkeye mentioned, ditch the swivel base. You never actually need the vise to swivel, you just need the ability to mount it at all different angles.

Which brings us to a different problem: mounting. The vise that came with my Ammco has two critical features: a central mounting post (goes through the table to a nut/washer combo on the underside of the table top), and a way so that it can easily be aligned to a 'normal' (jaws perpendicular to the ram travel) orientation via the central slot.

The keyway is easy; the mounting post, not so much. You might consider making your own graduated base which incorporates one. This is not as bad as it sounds: the base itself does not need to swivel, as the central post acts as the pivot. Of course this assumes the Atlas as the same style of vise mount - if it doesn't, then you'll need to come up with a mounting plate that can be indexed to common angles (you really don't need all 360 of them, right?) using the table mounting holes.

I don't know what class of work you are doing, but don't fret overmuch about the clearance. The stroke of the ram and the  X-axis travel are much more limiting factors. You want the tool to be mounted as close to the end of the clapper as you can (unless you are doing dovetail or T-slot style work, in which case the point is moot), so tool stickout isn't an issue like with a mill.  Remember also that you can replace the lantern on the clapper (or even the entire clapper) in order to support front- (not down-) facing tools. Workpieces that eat up the space between the vise and tool are probably too large to be held in the vise anyways. Don't neglect the sides of the table for mounting.

I've been doing a lot of work on my Ammco this week to get DROs mounted. Dunno if I'll start a thread on that, as I'm not really the photojournalist sort so my projects are not documented. I think there's already a shaper DRO thread.

One last thought for newly-christened shaperheads: track down the Ian Bradley books The Shaping Machine and Lathe And Shaper Tools. Slim volumes, aimed at the hobbyist size of shaper, lots of good ideas. You can usually find the books cheaper when they are written under his pen name, Duplex.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 12, 2020)

ThinWoodsman said:


> As Hawkeye mentioned, ditch the swivel base. You never actually need the vise to swivel, you just need the ability to mount it at all different angles.
> 
> Which brings us to a different problem: mounting. The vise that came with my Ammco has two critical features: a central mounting post (goes through the table to a nut/washer combo on the underside of the table top), and a way so that it can easily be aligned to a 'normal' (jaws perpendicular to the ram travel) orientation via the central slot.
> 
> ...


Huh... I never thought about just modifying the vise to mount using only a single bolt to rotate that way.  Thats an interesting idea!  There is going to be a negative for the mounting post in the bottom (since that is how the swivel bases work).  On my mill, I do away with the keyway, the swivel base graduations are accurate enough to be within a thou across the jaws (which I fix when more accuracy is necessary).  Part of the reason I liked the swivel base.

The atlas just has 3 T-slots, so I was originally going to use the 'wing' mounts, and perhaps keep the swivel base for swiveling (as well as just find a 'shorter' way to mount it).

That first Ian Bradley book is spendy!  $100 is the cheapest I could find it!  The second, even under the 'duplex' name still seems to be $65.


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## ThinWoodsman (Jun 12, 2020)

Not worth it. Wait a bit, the price will go down when nobody buys it at "w00t collectorz!!!!" prices. It isn't essential, and I think I overpaid at something close to fifty bucks with shipping
Abebooks has the tools book by duplex at about 15-20 bucks.

Ah, I see from lathes.co.uk that the Atlas table doesn't have a dedicated hole for the vise. That's unfortunate, it really knocks some height off the vise.
You can kinda see it here:





There's even a matching hole on the side! (attribution)


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## ThinWoodsman (Jun 12, 2020)

One other thing that the pictures on the lathes.co.uk site reminded me of: you can get a lot of mileage from clamping a toolbit directly in the lantern, without using a toolholder. Look for a 3/8"x3/4" toolbit (3/8 is the maximum width the lantern on my Ammco can handle). Usually they are 6" long, so you can score one at 3" with a cutoff wheel or dremel, then snap it in a vise (cover with a shop rag if you value your eyes). Grind as usual, perhaps rounding the back since it will be striking the workpiece - with 3/4" depth to play with, don't worry, the tool will be stout enough.

These may be deep enough to recreate some of the forged shapes in the Bradley book, though I haven't tried yet. That's a lot of grinding. Hmmm.... carbide endmill?


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## ErichKeane (Jun 18, 2020)

*Unpacking, examining:*

Ok, first, this is worse than I thought it had any right to be.  From a distance, it looks acceptable, but when I dug into it it was bad.  It came with some mounting T-bolts and a set of ways 'keys'.  However, the *first *problem I discovered; They lied about the height!  I was accepting of the 2.7", but it turns out that is the VISE only, NOT including the rotary base! Everything included, the total height is about 3.910.  You'll see how much of a problem that is later.

Here is everything included in the box (on my shop sweatshirt to protect my tablesaw top  ).



Pulled off the base, it looks pretty normal.  There is a little bit of surface rust and some dings around, but nothing horrible.  I WILL say that their grinding at least isn't too bad, it doesn't rock on the surface plate (none of the ground surfaces do).



However, I immediately noticed something odd.  The moving jaw actually doesn't seem 'centered'.  It is flush in the 2nd picture, and short on the other.  It turns out, the bed itself isn't even!  It is an extra 50 thou wide on one side.  Fortunately, it seems the 'extra' width is on the 'outside' based on some other measurements I made.  High quality casting we've got here...





I pulled a bit more off, the jaws came off easy enough, as well as the stationary jaw.  There were 2 keys (not even centered), but at least they were tight.




I found this part interesting on the back of the moving jaw.  You'll see why this is as bad as it is later, but the 'relief' cuts for the corners look like they were done by a coke-head badger.  You'll also note they did the little half-moon there and there is actually a casting defect in it.





And the underside.  Here is where I realized that NOTHING that isn't immediately visible is ground.  There is just the horrible milled finish down here.  Somehow they managed to do the relief cuts at a weird angle.




The screw itself seems alright, I found the other washer for the thrust bearing after this.




You can't really see it here, but the little half-ball is inside there.  When I got this, it was stuck!  It wouldn't move at all!  The grease holding it in was so gritty that it wouldn't move at all.  I ended up pulling it out, wiping it off, and using the rest as a ghetto lapping compound. it now moves only mostly terribly.




Remember when I said nothing was ground that wasn't immediately visible?  These are the jaw surfaces under the removable jaws.  You can't tell very easily, but the fixed jaw actually has a pretty significant burr in this one from milling.  




In comparison, here is the 'outside' jaws, that are visible.




I also noticed THIS.  The nut itself is milled in a few places, but noticeably NOT where it interacts with the half-ball.  This is likely on the 'to be fixed' list.




AND here is the height problem.  I've got the table all the way down and everything stacked up.  It looks like it brings me down to only ~2" over the jaws with the tool in the highest position.  ThinWoodsman suggested not using the tool holder, which will buy me extra space, but I likely want to get as much room as I can.

1 more interesting thing I'm reminded of from this picture: The base looks to have the degree markers 'laser etched', but there is no corresponding tick mark on the vise itself!  You can see the little milled spot for it, but they never actually drew it in!




Unfortunately the wings on this piece don't line up with the vise in this orientation.  If I want to use it without the base, I will need to use it in the other orientation.




The base itself is a touch too long to get into the T-slots.  One step of this is likely going to be to shorten those wings a bunch, plus make the slots about 3/8" closer to the center on each side.




I knocked out the pin and was interested to see that it is simply a piece of cold-roll that they didn't even bother machining to diameter.  All my other bases (Kurt or nice clones) are at least machined (if not ground).



I decided to knock out the ball-oiler at one point.  This one was AWFUL.  The ball would quickly get stuck ~1/2 way up, and it was super rough.  I want to mill the top face down low enough that I think I'll get into this hole, and didn't want to hit it with the mill.





All told, I think I can take about 3/4" off without much effort.  I'm going to aim to get this down to ~3" if at all possible.  I'm likely going to bring the removable jaws down from 0.945 to significantly less, I might aim for .750.

I will likely use it without the rotary base most of the time, but when doing internal fixtures on gears/etc, I obviously will need the rotary base to mount this at the other orientation.

Anyway, thoughts/feedback welcome!  I'm not too concerned about ruining this, I only have about $70 into it so if I ruin it, I'm alright with that  I'll likely be aggressive with my material removal as a result.


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## JRaut (Jun 18, 2020)

Looks like you've got your work cut out for ya!

You should track how many hours you put into it, divide by the cost of a Kurt or similar, and see what your time is worth. 

I think someone else mentioned the idea of NOT using a tool holder, and instead mounting your ground HSS tool bit directly in the lantern holder. That'd give you an extra inch or two of headroom, by the looks of things.


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## Buffalo21 (Jun 18, 2020)

Interesting build, it looks like there will be some serious whittling, to get that vise shaped object down to a workable size. I just went and looked at my Atlas 7B and the Altas shaper vise on it, there is a very noticeable difference in size.

After reading everyone’s comments, it appears, I’m the only person who seems to use the swivel base under the milling machine vise on a regular basis, to me its been a extreme benefit.


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## ThinWoodsman (Jun 18, 2020)

Is the base of the vise (without the swivel) larger than the table? You could mill out a table-sized pocket in the base, then find some way to mount it.

Or fabricate a tooling plate that mounts to the sides of the table (been sketching out ideas for one of these myself - U shape at table height, or rectangle with a picket milled out for the table, leaving maybe 1/4" over the table surface) to give yourself a larger surface to attach to - and with holed drilled precisely where they are needed.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 18, 2020)

ThinWoodsman said:


> Is the base of the vise (without the swivel) larger than the table? You could mill out a table-sized pocket in the base, then find some way to mount it.
> 
> Or fabricate a tooling plate that mounts to the sides of the table (been sketching out ideas for one of these myself - U shape at table height, or rectangle with a picket milled out for the table, leaving maybe 1/4" over the table surface) to give yourself a larger surface to attach to - and with holed drilled precisely where they are needed.



It is longer, but narrower I think.  I'm actually already considering removing the fixed-jaw-side 'drip tray so that I could potentially mount it closer to the machine.

I'm curious to see what your tooling plate looks like! I've been trying to think of a way to make a way of mounting with a rotary base too!  Someone above mentioned that some shapers of this size use a center mounting hole.  I am not particularly confident a single mounting bolt would keep this from spinning, otherwise I'd make a plate that has a mounting hole on all 4 corners into the table, then a center pin.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 18, 2020)

*Day 2: Starting on the bases:*

I decided to start on the body.  I wanted to remove ~.200, so I started on the mill and tool off about .190 with a flycutter setup to do the full cut.  The video/image of me cutting near the end is too big to upload. As a result of this cut, I lose the keys which kind of stinks but I wasn't particularly confident in them being straight anyway. Additionally, I'm going to have to get short head socket-head-cap-screws (or further counterbore!) since they now stick out the bottom.  I probably want to do an Ace run for shorter ones once I hack apart the rest anyway, so I'm not too worried.
*

*

I opted to surface grind this face before flipping to make sure I end up with a compounding error.  The surface grinder is the most accurate machine in my shop, so I'll take advantage of that.

*

*

Here is the bottom off the grinder.  The finish ended up pretty bad, I think I did a poor job dressing the wheel this time and it ended up leaving a rough finish.  BUT, it is flat, so I'm happy for now.  Out of the ~2.7" for the vise, and 3.910" of total height, I've knocked almost exactly .200" off!  My goal is sub-2" for the vise+jaws, and ~2.8" with the rotary base.  We'll see how that works out 

*

*

I didn't have enough usable room next to my DX6, so I had to pull it and face off this.  Again, I did this with a fly cutter.  The 'rails' themselves are a about .520", and I aimed for .300".  Spoilers: after grinding I hit it exactly!

*

*

After fly cutting, I ended up with a really smooth finish. I DID lose the rear hump of the handle section as it is now smooth (don't worry about that thin webbing on the left, it is well supported by the iron all the way around). Losing that hump didn't matter, as the jaw couldn't get that far back anyway. I also lost the keys of the fixed jaw. I had about zero confidence that it was square to the rails anyway, so I'll have no problem re-cutting them accurately later.
*

*

I then surface ground this side.  It came out WAY better.  At least the nice side is on the top.  I DO have a red wheel I might try out at the end of this project if I want stuff to sparkle.  I used a blue wheel recently and was very impressed with how shiny it ended up, so perhaps I'll do that too.

*

*

For the rotary base, I considered cutting it on the mill.  However, I found that my mounting bolts would get in the way, and I'd have a bunch of trouble getting the fly cutter moving around it.  SO, I mounted it to the shaper table and went to town!  I was hoping to get a little more than .100 thou out of this, and did quite a bit more!

*




*

I'm fortunate I gave up at this point!  I have JUST the ends of the single-degree ticks left!  I didn't mind too much, as I figured 90/45/60/30 are my most important anyway, but it would be nice to keep these.  If they end up being TOO bad, I might see if I can get this on my rotary table and find a way to cut these instead of the laser writing.

*

*

I didn't get a chance to grind this, as I got called in for dinner!  All told, the progress is:

*Main Body:* Started: 1.830.
After milling the bottom: 1.650
After Grinding the bottom: 1.630
After milling the top: 1.410
After grinding the top: 1.407
Savings: .423"

*Rotary Base: *Started: 1.162
After shaping the top: 1.027
Savings (so far!): .135

For the base, I want to pick up another ~.200-.250 off the base to get to under .800 in height.

I'm planning on getting the jaws down quite small as well, they are currently ~.950, and I hope to have them at about .650 when I'm done.  This should leave me at 2" for the main vise, plus an extra ~.800 for the rotary base.


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## hman (Jun 19, 2020)

I once did a cleanup/refurb on a similar Chinese mill vise that I bought used.  The entire half-ball assembly was rough-cast on mine, too.  Filed the flat area on the nut.  Then, measuring the diameter of the ball, I wore down a Dremel cutoff wheel (#420 or 409) to as close to the same size as possible.  Used that to smooth out the ball seat as best I could, kept checking it for smoothness with the tip of my finger.  The vise works pretty well now.

I do occasionally wish I had a surface grinder.  Ah, well ...


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## ErichKeane (Jun 19, 2020)

*Day 3, a little more grinding!*

I only had a little more than an hour today, but I did some grinding milling and grinding.  

I ground started by fly cutting, but I ended up having to switch to a carbide face mill since the speed was too much for the bolt I used to hold down the center:




I then straightened it more or less to the T slots and milled the mounting holes inward about 1/4" on each side to make it fit my table.




I cleaned up an area for the bolt as well.  I ended up grinding a thick washer down a bit flat on one side to mount.


I popped the pivot back in and remounted!




I ground the base and reground the bottom of the body of the vise while I was at it.  The base itself is down to .853, so I saved more than .300!  

The body went down another 2-3 thou as I wanted to clean up the grind and it came out much better!  

Next I want to mill the keyway in the body, which should be its last Op on that part.  

I'm hoping I can get another 3-400 thou out of the vise jaws as well to minimize the height.


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## Lo-Fi (Jun 20, 2020)

Is it going to be rigid enough on that swivel base? And will be base stand up to the forces? They're only designed for moderate side loads, with most of the work being done with a rotary cutting tool. The shaper produces huge linear forces by comparison. Worst case is having the vise oriented with jaws parallel to the cross feed: the entire section under the fixed jaw is unsupported until you reach the bolts at the middle. The T bolts are fixed into the base which you've removed a fair bit of meat from. I reckon you may end up cracking the swivel base, or at very least ending up with the vise lifting at the front as the cuts start. My mechanical spidey sense is tingling! Hehe. 

But... I have an idea! There's a better way to do this. What's the max swing on your lathe? Or even better, do you have a rotary table for your mill?


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## Lo-Fi (Jun 20, 2020)

If you've got the means, it's entirely possible to modify the vise so it has it own swivel base. you'll lose some strength out of it, of course, but put it right back in with a hefty round steel base. I reckon a 15mm steel plate ought to be plenty. It's not drawn to scale, and not even completely throught through, but I think it's a workable idea. Few things I've already thought up since drawing it, like radius the cutout in the vise base to avoid the sharp corner, zig-zag the bolts etc. Needs a lot of finessing. Gains you the entire height of the swivel base and a ton of rigidity, though! The advatanges being that the entire base of the vise rests on the table, and you can clamp it under the fixed jaw where it's most needed. You'd probably want to knock up a special set of toe clamps to suit too.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 20, 2020)

That's an interesting idea!

As far as, will this be strong enough: we will see  it is for a small shaper, which people often use the small drill press vises with success. I believe this to still be stronger than one of those. 

Frankly, this is a cheap experiment more than anything. 

As far as lathe swing: 16" . My rotary table is pretty small though.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 20, 2020)

*Day 4: Trying to put it back together...*

I'd decided that I didn't want to worry about taking another ~.400 off the jaws until I needed it, so I figured I should start putting things back together.  I had looked at the moving jaw and realized the 'top' of it was pretty thin anyway, so I don't think I could take anymore off the top.

I managed to mill the relief in the moving jaw, and grind what the factory 'forgot', the bottom and under-jaw faces of both.  However, troubles started when I went to put the nut back in/back together.  I don't have much pictures from the end where things were worst, but I'll describe it at the end  
But first, I had to cut the slot for the fixed jaw keys.  It was pretty simple, I mounted it to the table and indicated on the inside of the bed, probably the only straight surface on this whole darn thing.


The key was a little larger than 3/8", so a 3/8" endmill did the trick.  I ended up bolting the jaw on losely at first, then using blue/a scratching tool to figure out what the min/max area was for the key, and lined it up off of that.



My first mistake of the day.... I realized that the moving jaw (which used to get hung up on that back) actually wouldn't move at all since now it was flat back here.  I went to town with a carbide die grinder, and made a mess of it.  I opted to give up about here.  



Here you can see I ground/relief cut the bottom of the moving jaw, this went easy enough!




After further inspection, I realized I could just use a file on the back of the fixed jaw (see the picture after this one!) and get back quite a bit more range.  I ended up at about 2 1/4" jaw opening.




This is the filing, I rounded over those edges to fit into the back of the channel.





I set the nut up in the mill and cut the 45 degree angle.  I had to take A LOT of material, as it wasn't even close to 45 degrees.  This is probably the beginning of my downfall 



I also realized (or thought I had), that the cast face here was hitting the bottom of the jaw.  So I tried to remove it with the fly cutter.  The fly cutter had a hell of a time, so I moved onto plan b.




Plan B was making the shaper do it!  It seemed to do an acceptable job right up until I snapped the bit!  I wasn't taking deep cuts, but this cast iron ended up having some horribly hard spots that got the shaper mad.  in the end, this part didn't go terribly.



For the inside, I switched to a 60 degree 3/8" HSS bit I had.  It isn't a great geometry for the shaper but seemed to do the job anyway.




Then, I decided to assemble it again and made some bad discoveries...  I discovered that the moving jaw was actually hitting the TOP of the 45 degree angle, so I took ~200 thou off of that, which allowed it to lay flat.  It then seemed to be assembled, but the moving jaw was VERY lose, even after putting the set screw in the back.

I think I now have 2 issues:  The 45 degree angle doesn't go 'low enough', so I have to use an endmill to reset and make that go all the way down to the base.  Second, I've reduced the length of the 45 degree section by quite a bit, so the set screw is no longer long enough.  Hopefully between the two I can get this working.  I've chosen to not take any more out of the jaws, so I'm basically at the 'end' of this project.

I'm still hopeful I'll get  a usable vise out of this, even if it is a little taller than I'd like.  I still think it'll clamp correctly, so I'm going to continue on the project.


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## hman (Jun 20, 2020)

Erich -
After reading your initial post, I'd ordered one of these for myself - just the right size for my DynaMyte DM2400 CNC mill!  I already have a 3 incher, but it has some problems of its own.  And for the price, I figgered I had little to lose.  It arrived yesterday, after I'd posted.

I've disassembled it and found pretty much the same issues you did.  I don't have a surface grinder, so I'll just file and stone where necessary.  Interesting thing about the half-nut.  I'd assumed from your posts and from the (5") vise refurb I did years ago that the half-ball would be more-or less shiny and well finished steel.  Wrong!  It's rough-as-a-corn-cob cast iron.  Both the flat and the curved faces are terrible.  Durn!

I filed the angled face of the nut flat, as I'd done with my previous refurb.  I also filed the "flat" face of the half-ball.  The "spherical" face has me in a quandry.  I tried sanding on it with foam-basked sandpaper, and got some of the worst spikes and burrs off.  But going further will be a real chore.  PS - I did find a nice way to hold the ball while sanding - use a longish round bar super-magnet for a handle.

I see three possible paths forward:
1.  Do the best I can on the half-ball and its pocket, and call it good.  The real angle-lock (sliding) function happens at the flat faces anyway.  This is the easiest solution, and might well be OK.

2.  Disassemble my existing 3 incher, check the quality of the half-ball, and swap if it's better.  Then sell the old vise on Craigslist (with full disclosure).  I do plan to sell the old one in any case.

3.  Look for a bearing ball of the right diameter, mount it somehow, and sand/grind off one side.  I started by looked through my collection of bearing balls, but found nothing of the right size.  The problem is how to acquire a ~½" diameter ball.  Guess I could post a help request on the forum.

PS to everybody else - I didn't bother to take any pictures ... Erich's are so good.  I'll continue to report on progress.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 20, 2020)

Wow, you're braver than I am! I wouldn't get into this without a surface grinder!

I am planning on polishing the flat side of the ball and calling it done. I might belt sand the rounded part a little, but it's about as good as it can get without being able to get inside the socket side.

I WILL say I'm surprised to find my jaws were square. If I were to do this again, I might do Lo-fis idea of a rotary base and just grind the bed - unground sections of the jaws, and clean up the nut.  I think my attempt to make this so much shorter is just leading to a painful experience 



hman said:


> Erich -
> After reading your initial post, I'd ordered one of these for myself - just the right size for my DynaMyte DM2400 CNC mill!  I already have a 3 incher, but it has some problems of its own.  And for the price, I figgered I had little to lose.  It arrived yesterday, after I'd posted.
> 
> I've disassembled it and found pretty much the same issues you did.  I don't have a surface grinder, so I'll just file and stone where necessary.  Interesting thing about the half-nut.  I'd assumed from your posts and from the (5") vise refurb I did years ago that the half-ball would be more-or less shiny and well finished steel.  Wrong!  It's rough-as-a-corn-cob cast iron.  Both the flat and the curved faces are terrible.  Durn!
> ...


Bsuracw


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## hman (Jun 22, 2020)

Today I completed the "fluff 'n buff," plus a couple of modifications, on my 3" vise.


ErichKeane said:


> Wow, you're braver than I am! I wouldn't get into this without a surface grinder!


It should be mentioned that my goals and ErichKeane's weren't exactly the same.  His goal was to build a precision tool for a shaper.  My goal was to produce a functional vise for my little bitty DM2400 CNC mill.  So I was pretty much satified with getting it cleaned up, smoothing out the rough (milled but not ground) surfaces, and adding some alignment features (described below).

In an earlier post I'd mentioned that the half-ball in the new vise was really rough.  One of my possible plans for dealing with this was to see if the ball in my existing 3" vise might be better and worth swapping out.  I was lucky!  The photos below show the half-balls from the two vises.  The "old" one (from the black vise) is nicely smooth.


The photo also illustrates the main problem I had with the old vise.  Note that the screws used to attach the fixed jaw come in from the top.  Turns out they're so close to the jaw face screws that they interfere with each other!  The fixed jaw attachment screws in the new vise come in from below, and are well clear of the jaw face screws.  The photo below shows the back sides of old and new half-balls.  Note that the "new" one is still somewhat rough, even after having been sanded.  The "old" half-ball is machined and smooth.



The next photo shows the smoothing I did on the underside of the moving jaw.  Not only was the surface just milled and not ground, but as you can see from the contours of the partially filed (lighter) areas, it was uneven in other ways.  I got each side as flat as I could with a fine file.  Didn't worry about the relative heights or alignment of the two sides.  My main purpose was take away the high spots and smooth the movement of the jaw.  The next photo shows the half-ball pocket in the jaw after I'd ground it with a small stone mounted on my Dremel.  As I'd mentioned in a previous post, my goal was to make the sand-rough "as cast" surface at least somewhat smooth to the touch.  It feels a lot smoother than it looks in the photo.





After breaking the sharp edges of the cast parts (using tha manly art of draw filing), I cleaned everything up, gave it a wipe with an oily rag, and reassembled.  

I then added alignment features to the base of the vise, parallel and perpendicular to the fixed jaw face.  These fearures (also visible on the old vise) allow me to align the vise on my mill table with just a machinist's square or a parallel held against the front edge of the table.  Using this technique I can get squareness to within .001" or so.  Plenty good for CNC work!  For one thing, I always mill the perimeter of the part anyway, so the alignment of the raw stock is seldom critical.  For another, I generally work with plastic of various flavors on  small CNC mill.  And plastic is well known for its tendency to move, shrink/swell, and distort during and after machining.  So an inaccuracy of a thou or two will disappear in the noise.

To begin with, I clamped a stack of my tallest parallels in my big mill vise and indicated the fixed-jaw side to within .0005.  Then I closed the new vise down on the parallels, which were now the reference surface.  Because this arrangemet was just a bit flimsy, I took very light cuts (.005 to .010) on the periphery of the new vise, first with a rougher, then with a finishing end mill.





Finally, because I'd milled away the ears around the mounting slot on one side of the vise, I deepened the slot a bit.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 22, 2020)

That is great!  Thanks for sharing!  I am just going to try to polish by my ball to see if it is good enough, but that replacement looks way better   If Kurt didn't have a $25 minimum, I'd just buy a replacement.

I went out to mess with it a bit last night and was able to tighten the set screw in the back a little further that cured my jaw problem!  So, I think I'm done other than whatever I can fix with the 1/2 ball!


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## hman (Jun 22, 2020)

That half-ball is really a piece of work, isn't it.  Perhaps you can find a ball bearing ball with a diameter between 11.5mm and 12.5mm (which includes ½") and proceed as I'd planned as one of my paths forward.  Soft solder it to a length of brass or steel pipe, grind away half of it, then unsolder and hot-wipe the solder residue off.  The solder should hold the ball well enough.  I was planning to do the grinding by hand, quenching frequently to prevent the solder melting.  You might well be able to do it on your surface grinder ... much finer control!


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## ErichKeane (Jun 22, 2020)

hman said:


> That half-ball is really a piece of work, isn't it.  Perhaps you can find a ball bearing ball with a diameter between 11.5mm and 12.5mm (which includes ½") and proceed as I'd planned as one of my paths forward.  Soft solder it to a length of brass or steel pipe, grind away half of it, then unsolder and hot-wipe the solder residue off.  The solder should hold the ball well enough.  I was planning to do the grinding by hand, quenching frequently to prevent the solder melting.  You might well be able to do it on your surface grinder ... much finer control!



I've no idea how I can hold them, but I just picked up a bunch of 1/2" ball bearings on amazon, so I'll give it a go!  I have no idea how I can hold it in the surface grinder... I wonder if 'boxing' it in on the mag chuck would work...


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## cjtoombs (Jun 22, 2020)

ErichKeane said:


> I've no idea how I can hold them, but I just picked up a bunch of 1/2" ball bearings on amazon, so I'll give it a go!  I have no idea how I can hold it in the surface grinder... I wonder if 'boxing' it in on the mag chuck would work...



You could plunge a 1/2"  ball end mill into a piece of stock about a half inch deep and then use either super glue, or if your worried about the strength of the supper glue then epoxy, the ball bearing into the stock and hold that.  Heat will release them and if you get by with super glue, acetone will clean it up nicely.  I've used super glue for workholding on the lathe many times, it's fine if you don't get the part too hot.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 22, 2020)

cjtoombs said:


> You could plunge a 1/2"  ball end mill into a piece of stock about a half inch deep and then use either super glue, or if your worried about the strength of the supper glue then epoxy, the ball bearing into the stock and hold that.  Heat will release them and if you get by with super glue, acetone will clean it up nicely.  I've used super glue for workholding on the lathe many times, it's fine if you don't get the part too hot.


I don't have a 1/2" ball endmill :/  Not sure it is worth the cost for this project.  I spent a little more time on it flattening the back (which mine is in much better shape than the one above) and rubbing it with some lapping compound in the hole, and it is pretty good!

Unfortunately, I DID have to make the nut 45 a bunch deeper (as the ridge from the end of hte endmill I cut there was causing jaw rise), and I ended up stripping the bolts going to the fixed jaw in the process of removing the nut.  SO, I need an ace run sometime soon to just get it back to working.

Otherwise, it seems to run pretty decently.


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## ErichKeane (Jun 24, 2020)

Alright, I think I'm done 

I replaced the fixed jaw bolts with domed Allen screws, and added a M6 rod for the moving jaw tightening bolt. I was STILL getting a ton of jaw lift, like 10 thou! I added some dykem in a bunch of places, and inspected for a while, and realized I was bottoming out the ball a bit, just enough to lift.

So, I put the nut in my mill again, this time at 50 degrees(I figured being a little steeper would help make it slide better), and milled further down. I went quite a bit further this time.

I reassembled, still with the stock ball, and tightened the keeper bolt, and no more jaw lift when I tightened it! I also added a new ball oiler (6mm).

I probably have 1 more task, but it can wait. I have to cut the angle indicator at one point, since the stock one (which doesn't even have the line!) Is on the far side. I figure I'll file a flat when I get it squared, and file the marker line too.


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## Dabbler (Jun 24, 2020)

You both remind me of Stefan Gotteswinter when he bought a Vertex rotary table and treated it as a casting kit to make a really beautiful RT out of it!!  Very nicely done!


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