Tuning up my Versatile Vice

Have you clocked the mill table as not really worth measuring anything stood on it and getting meaningful results if that is off, even that other vice on the left side could be throwing the readings.

Not quite sure what you mean, Jason.

I clocked the face of the body of the vice and it was true.

I put a 15mm jaw on it which was 0.01mm- 0.02mm out and got a 0.05mm error.

I can't really see the table having such an effect over 15mm!

And yes, I have in my post on 'living with the VM32L' - though I have still more to do on that when I get the chance.

Iain

Edited By Iain Downs on 03/05/2020 19:51:53

He he. That's precisely what I suggested yesterday morning🙂.

Suggestion: You start your measurements at the table surface.

It's a bit hard to tell exactly what you were measuring from the description.

You said face was 0.01 in the previous post not that it was true, variance in jaw actually 0.026 ( 14.321 - 14.295)so possible total of 0.036 which is close to the 0.04 you said you measured in the earlier post not 0.05 that you are now saying.

Assuming vice on table and using X&Y table movements then it would be wise to check that the table is moving in a completely flat plane first

Not brillant. I haven't measured all four corners on the fixed jaw on my vice but I have measured the two top corners. I couldn't tell the difference with a tenths micrometer. So less than a tenth variation. But the vice was a tad more expensive.

I measured the jaw as I don't use keys but indicate the vice each time I move it. It's convenient to use the back face of the fixed jaw but I wanted to know how it related to the side that mates with the work.

Andrew

So, I've stripped the vice down - that is the jaws off and the fixed block removed. A bit of grit under that as well. The edges of the underneath were also a bit rough so I took the edge off.

I spent some time measuring the fixed block with and without the jaw on.

The fixed block is quite rough on the side facing the jaw. The depth is various by around 0.03mm across the surface with a distinct channel in the vertical direction around the middle. of the block. There is more variance at the bottom of the block than further up.

Despite this and the earlier reported irregularity of the jaw, with the jaw on there is a drop of about 0.01mm across the top of the jaw and block assembly and about 0.02 across the bottom.

I checked out the height of the sliding surfaces on the surface table and they seemed spot on. This measurement was more dubious as the vice is longer and nearly as wide as my surface table!

After cleaning and re-assembly, I put the vice back on the mill and clocked the fixed jaw. This now shows a deviation of 0.025mm (one thou) from left to right.

So my conclusion is that the problem was mainly down to dirt in the vice. one thou out across 5 inches is more than enough for just about everything I do. If I have an unexpected need for better than that I wlll take the fixings off and clock it in the normal way.

Many thanks for all the advice.

Iain