MetalworkingFun Forum

I've been thinking about my next purchase, and think a new vice for my mill is in order. Any thoughts?

Mike, My wife got me this vise for my birthday last year and it is pretty nice for the price.  I posted a thread on this in the Milling Machine forum about taking it apart and cleaning it.

http://www.metalworkingfun.com/showthread.php?tid=2343

So far it works fine for my Harbor Freight round column mill.  It is just a Chinese knock off of a Kurt style but I am happy.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/4-PRECISION-MILL...5b0b3cfdde

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I'm very pleased with my 4" vice but I sometimes wish I'd bought a swivel one. Now I'm thinking I should buy a tilt and swivel 3" as a supplementary vice.

JScott, I did read about your vice before, nice post. I'm afraid I might not be as lucky as you and I'll get a lemon. I'd love to buy a Kurt, but not in the budget now, and the used ones on eBay scare me too, don't want to buy someone else's trash for top dollar. I am seriously considering the vice you bought.

Look at Glacern Tools or see if Jeff Beck at tools4cheap is still able to get Kurt vices at a discount.

Edit: Doesn't look like Jeff offers them any more.

I have a couple Kurt knockoffs, one if them was decent quality, the other one required a few hours of work on the mill to make it right and it's still the crappiest vise I own. I bought a 4" Glacern vise about a year ago and I think it's fantastic quality and a decent price. None of the knockoffs even have square solid jaws, I have to get close when indicating and ignore the bumps and divots. This is a video showing the glacern vice and indicator.

I forgot to say that I have a Vertex (Taiwanese) 6" vise that I purchased some time ago for my mill.  It looks to be of very good quality and I used it on my shaper recently. It comes with a swivel base (although it will be mounted directly to the table). One thing I did notice when I was wiping off the cosmoline was that they have milled a slot into the bottom of the vise.  Once the mill is up and running I plan to fit some key stock and see how parallel the slot it to the fixed jaw.

I'm unsure if these are available in the US or not but if you see one you should consider it.

As Darren (Mayhem) mentioned about the swivel base, make sure you really need one they eat up Z axis capacity and many of us have removed them due mainly to lack of use.

Steve

I've stood in front of your milling machine Mike and agree that a 4 or 5 inch vise would be best, and you don't need to spend money on the swivel base. I had one with my Chinese knock-off vise and had it on to start with my newer Alliant mill. When I checked the ground surface that the jaws ride on for parallelism to the machine travel, it was out in both planes. Rather than taking it all apart and grinding, I just took the swivel base off and rechecked. It was within .002" or so.

I used that vise for a couple of years, then was gifted a Kurt D60. And later, a Kurt D675. I can tell you the difference between a quality vise and the cheap Chinese ones is something you don't appreciate until you've used both. On my machine the progression was a beat-up old Bridgeport 5" vise with really short jaws (on my original 1960 Bridgeport), the 6" Chinese one, then the Kurt's. Save yourself my learning curve. And I should have known better, being a machinist for a living and all.

Your machine isn't really big enough for a 6" vise, but it may fit without the swivel base. A 4" vise might be a better fit, but if you ever upgrade to a newer/bigger machine it'll be small. Look at Glacern and Teco. I was talking with a Parlec rep and he told me that they sold their vise line to Teco, they are made in Taiwan. I think Glacern does the same thing.

Will do Ken. I remember the look on you face when you saw my vice. If I was smart enough, I should have been embarrassed. A prime example of Ignorance being bliss! I do have my eye out for a new to me mill. I really want a Bridgeport size machine, but not sure How I can get it into my basement.