My knife vise build.......

J

jaxxas

Well-Known Member
So new to the hobby, still (impatiently) waiting on my Pheer grinder, so after reading Ed Caffrey's thread (Thank you Ed!) I thought I'd build a knife vise this weekend. So I started tonight Friday, May 6 and I got the 3.5"x3.5"x3/16" steel tubing cut to 8 inches. Guessing my measurements off of the pictures that Ed provided in his thread but I'm probably wrong on many of them, hopefully it will all work out!

Almost all the material to be used are scrap hanging around the shop except for the ACME screw. So last week I ordered a 1/2"-10 x 4" ACME threaded leveler (rated at 7500 lbs!) from McMaster Carr, $20 or so, and I lucked out as I included it in an order with the company I work for so shipping was nada. It has a total of 15 degrees of swivel and I will have to work out a way to keep it captive to the upper steel jaw.

Didn't have much time tonight, but I cut the tube to length, did the layout and drilled the first hole tonight. First order of business tomorrow is to blow out a 2" hole in the bottom for the leveler (nearly 2" wide) to feed up through the tube and cut the side apertures with the plasma torch. Then I'll look at cutting 1/4" to 3/8" plates for the vise jaws. I'm currently thinking I will use some white HDPE I have hanging about to make non-marring jaw covers. Probably dill and tap them with some small countersunk machine screws to secure them to the primary steel jaws. Not sure that HDPE is the way to go on this, but live and learn!




The raw material.....





The ACME leveler....




First hole drilled at 9/16".....

I'll try to update this for those interested throughout the weekend assuming life doesn't get in the way......
 
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Quick update on what I did yesterday, today will be a non-productive shop day!


Mostly I built everything except the non-marring jaws and the rotating pivot/bench mount. Also my goal was to build this vise so that it could be disassembled.







A picture of the main vise body and my other vice......







Bottom jaw....






Top jaw....








Assembled vise from the bottom.....






Closeup of the ACME leveler retaining plate. That rearmost bolt is a little tricky to insert....





Front view of assembled vise....






Vise clamping on a piece of 1.5"x1.5" sq tubing. After I get the HDPE jaw covers in place I should have about an inch total of jaw opening. I had hoped for more but the ACME leveler takes up more space than I had anticipated. An inch should cover most knife handles....







Rear view of the jaws open....
 
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That's a pretty creative use and assembly for the levelers. Looking forward to the next installment!
 
ARCustomKnives said:
That's a pretty creative use and assembly for the levelers. Looking forward to the next installment!
Click to expand...



Thanks Andrew! The next installment will be up tonight. I was left out of the Mother's Day festivities today as the GF and her family drove up to surprise her elderly Grandmother, the car was full and as I have never met Grandma I was the logical out. So a surprise shop day for me!

BTW I checked out and subscribed to your YouTube channel, very interesting, I really like the EDC scissors!
 
So as noted above I got the day off unexpectedly, so it was another shop day for me.

I finished the stand and the pivot. I made the stand extra long so I could invert it on the bench, just to have another position to work from. I have 2 different height benches in my shop, one mobile and the other fixed. The fixed is set for my working standing height, the mobile is set for my sitting height. I thought that being able to hang the knife vise from the benches might prove valuable. I plan on using a C-clamp to secure the vise to my benches so I didn't drill any large securing holes. Both of my bench tops are made of plate steel and things clamp up tight to them.

After finishing the fabrication, I sandblasted everything in preparation for paint. My sand blasting media is about wore out so it's not the best finish. Hung all the parts in my makeshift paint booth in my shop and spray painted it primer grey. Seems I have little imagination when it comes to color, plus I already had the paint!

I also cut the HDPE to 3" wide. I made a few extra pieces to use to shim the vise to a height where I could place stock in horizontally between the V apertures.

I was thinking to screw the jaw covers to the primary jaws but as the jaw covers are so thin at 1/4" I decided I would just use contact cement. Unfortunately I'm out of contact cement so I will pick up some tomorrow.



Here's the pictures....




Sandblasted parts.....



The primary jaws already painted....





The white HDPE jaw covers and the extra jaw shims.....





My improvised paint booth in action.....


Tomorrow I will pick up some contact cement, glue the jaws on, and do the final assembly the day after, then I will post the final pictures!
 
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jaxxas said:
Thanks Andrew! The next installment will be up tonight. I was left out of the Mother's Day festivities today as the GF and her family drove up to surprise her elderly Grandmother, the car was full and as I have never met Grandma I was the logical out. So a surprise shop day for me!

BTW I checked out and subscribed to your YouTube channel, very interesting, I really like the EDC scissors!
Click to expand...


Thanks for the sub! Thanks for the compliment on the scissors. I've prepped a handful to go to heat treat soon, made from AEB-L. I think they're gonna turn out nice.

I like the improvised paint booth. You seem to be full of good ideas. Do you have a YouTube as well?
If/when I ever get a welder, I'm definitely gonna refer back to this WIP. Lookin' good!
 
ARCustomKnives said:
Thanks for the sub! Thanks for the compliment on the scissors. I've prepped a handful to go to heat treat soon, made from AEB-L. I think they're gonna turn out nice.

I like the improvised paint booth. You seem to be full of good ideas. Do you have a YouTube as well?
If/when I ever get a welder, I'm definitely gonna refer back to this WIP. Lookin' good!
Click to expand...

Thanks Andrew!

I don't have a YouTube channel, thought about it a bit, but I don't have a camera and I'd have to clean up my dirty shop.

Good luck with the scissors!
 
jaxxas said:
Thanks Andrew!

I don't have a YouTube channel, thought about it a bit, but I don't have a camera and I'd have to clean up my dirty shop.

Good luck with the scissors!
Click to expand...

If I let a dirty shop stop me, I'd only have 1 or 2 videos up. ;)
 
So here is the final pictures of my knife vise build. And no, just in case somebody asks, the knife in the pictures was not made by me, it's a Texas Knifemaker blank.



The vise clamps up very tight on the knife blade, the rotation of the main body is fairly smooth and it also locks up tight.





















A picture showing it inverted......





And another inverted......



Overall I'm pretty happy with it......
 
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Nice work. Looks very functional. I have been putting off making a knife vice, but now I may have to.

-Aaron
 
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