X-Y vise recommendations

[Dale Halterman]

I have been wanting a decent or at least functional X-y vise for my drill press for some time, for assembling lock kits and so on. Good old American vises can be pricey, even used.

There are Asian vises available now, but I am really concerned about quality and accuracy. Do any of you guys have any experience with these? Are they better than nothing, or are they good only for doorstops?

Thanks

Dale H

[WKevinD]

I can give no definitive answer but I have been using a Harbor Freight  cross slide that was under $80.00 and I like it alot. I'm not sure it would be my first choice if I were assembling a lot of locks or for milling operations for barrel pins, lock bolts etc it's dead on.
Price and function worked for me.
Kevin

[dogcatcher]

I have this one from Grizzly Tools, it is a monster, well constructed and the best part is the gibs are adjustable to fine tine it's movement.  http://www.grizzly.com/products/4-Cross-Sliding-Vise/G1064?utm_campaign=zPage&utm_source=grizzly.com

[WKevinD]

I have this one from Grizzly Tools, it is a monster, well constructed and the best part is the gibs are adjustable to fine tine it's movement.  http://www.grizzly.com/products/4-Cross-Sliding-Vise/G1064?utm_campaign=zPage&utm_source=grizzly.com

Looks like mine except for the color, adjustable gibs also. The main screws have a rather heavy thread so really finite adjustment has to be done carefully.

Kevin

[ddoyle]

Dale,

you hit a soft spot with me. I 'had' (silly trade/ I lost) a micro mark variable speed drill press with thier x-y table. Nothing beats that set up for accurate drilling and tapping of locks.  Thought I could get by with my larger drill press and a drilling jig. wrong.  The micro mark table has about zero backlash and is rock solid. (mine was japanese NOT chinese)  I used a sacrificial plate on the t- slot table. Worked well enough that for fun and the challange I drilled an Index plate using the coordinate system on it. My worm gear indexer could not find any appreciable error in the work.  Also was a beauty for chain drilling.

That little drill press could be set on the kitchen table and you could work in a way that really reduced the amount of aggravation.

Most important I think is spinning those little drills fast enough and having a quality American made Spotting drill for what counts- but that is just my list of past excuses.

If your big press is not fast enough I had a degree of success running a sewing machine motor to the spindle with some of that rubber jewelers lathe belting. 

[Goo]

To spend or not to spend? That is the question, wether tis nobler in the shop to to suffer the slings and arrows over the humiliation of drifting hole positions and sloppy backlash of low price point lead screws or to endure the envy and compliments of of others over the precision and perfection of smoothly functioning assembled parts..................

[Chowmi]

To spend or not to spend? That is the question, wether tis nobler in the shop to to suffer the slings and arrows over the humiliation of drifting hole positions and sloppy backlash of low price point lead screws or to endure the envy and compliments of of others over the precision and perfection of smoothly functioning assembled parts..................

That was awesome!

[Dale Halterman]

Ay, there's the rub!

I have been using a homemade jig to hold parts in place, but it sure would be nice to have an x-y table to line them up more easily. But it the threads are too coarse and find adjustments are difficult it may not be worth the money. I think I am going to try to find a store that has them in stock and see what they look like.

Thanks for all the input, guys.

Dale H

[Bob Roller]

I have an American made heavy drill press and an X-Y 360 degree rotary table.
The drill press is Rockwell and the rotary X-Y table is Chicago Tool & Engineering
and both are American made from 1964. It is indispensable for lock and trigger
making.I paid $264 in honest currency for these two items when they were new.
Also a small tool room vertical mill,a Clausing 8520 new in 1967.
Today I have no idea if any of these rotary or X-Y tools are any good or not.
I have looked at them and don't think much of what I see at places like Harbor
Freight.On the other hand,I HAD to buy a new horizontal bandsaw last January
and Harbor Freight had one,made in China and I must admit that this thing is
really well made and so far so good.Until 4 January,2017 ALL of my power tools
were American made and I am still angry about have no American alternatives
or Canadian either as far as I know.

Bob Roller


 

[Bob Roller]

I have this one from Grizzly Tools, it is a monster, well constructed and the best part is the gibs are adjustable to fine tine it's movement.  http://www.grizzly.com/products/4-Cross-Sliding-Vise/G1064?utm_campaign=zPage&utm_source=grizzly.com

X-y and Z axis.Much better than only X-Y . 22 pounds is not heavy but for light
work it's probably OK.

Bob Roller

[Dale Halterman]

On the other hand, I don't know what Durs Egg, Mortimer, or Wogdon had in their shops. Maybe I should just be quiet and get better with the tools I have.

 Dale H

[ddoyle]

Bob,

I hear ya, when you look at the hundreds of machine tool manufacturers that used to exist in NA and then you realize that the ONLY manual lathe made in NA comes from Standard Modern in Canada (USN contracts keep em going IIRC) you know for certain we are all destined to be either cavemen or slaves!  He who builds the tooling rules.

[Bob Roller]

Bob,

I hear ya, when you look at the hundreds of machine tool manufacturers that used to exist in NA and then you realize that the ONLY manual lathe made in NA comes from Standard Modern in Canada (USN contracts keep em going IIRC) you know for certain we are all destined to be either cavemen or slaves!  He who builds the tooling rules.

We build the shops that sell semi edible food with tools from China.

Bob Roller