Drill table Clamp Vice and a treat for train buffs.

Hi All

I have seen this design before but this is a great image as a working start for anyone who would like to build one.

The video also has some wise words at 21 minutes. and a good family history of 3 generations of a metalworking family.

**LINK**

What a good idea!

There is an article with drawings published by Home Metal Shop Club, of Houston;

HomeMetalShopClub - Articles

Scroll down the list for 'Unconvential Drill Press Vice' by Dick Kostelnicek April 16 2011 - no.276.

Loads of other interesting stuff on their site, well worth a look..

Gotta love 'Merka. "I built me a 40 by 80 (foot) shop. Yes it could be bigger but..."

Have a look on the "Blondihacks" (Quinn Dunki) website where she makes one of these "float lock" vices. Several instalments if I remember correctly.

Mr Pete also did a series on building one. Always thought it looked a useful addition to a drill press

Float Lock Vise

Blondihacks' links to drawings are behind a Patron paywall. The drawings Mr Pete used are available here:

**LINK**

Rod

Why would she do that when the drawings are freely available on the internet

H

Hi
I guess I should have stressed my point about watching the comment near the end that starts at 21 minutes in the video. as a separate post.

Passing on the knowledge to ALL young people is very important to me.

It may even be that the era of the vast multinational world market is loosing steam, or at least levelling off. The lessons we are learning from serious supply issues including food, manufactured goods and raw materials is causing many governments to start thinking inward. You never know we may start to see a resurgence in local manufacturing.

No matter what happens the precious knowledge and existing small shop resources should be preserved.

Spread the word!

Regards
John

Conversely, it amazes me that China built itself up into the world's No1 manufacturer from almost nothing, with no great engineering tradition to pass down. Today, they must have more machine shops and tool and die shops than the rest of the world put together. How did they do that? True, they were previously self-sufficient and made everything themselves, but they had almost nothing. Bicycles and poor quality copies of World War 2 German motorcycles and equally ancient cars, that they produced year after year with no improvement or development. Now they make everything, including whole vehicles for the likes of BMW etc. Nobody passed ancient engineering knowledge down on how to do all that stuff. They just did it. Must have set up some massive engineering colleges and churned out graduates by the thousands or hundreds of thousands and set them to work until they got it right.

So I reckon we will be able to do it again if we have to. But next time around it will be all robots and CNC programming.

I agree, This may be a little old now but the great grandson still runs(not literally ) into my workshop to see what I am up to and is always full of questions which I answer to the best of my knowledge. He is now 9

He always sits at the back of the bench and not right on the edge

Edited By Derek Lane on 26/06/2022 10:21:13

Hopper writes that nobody "passed that ancient knowledge" to the Chinese - no they bought it. The did not buy Saab from GM because they wanted to build Saabs, they bought it because they wanted to know why Saabs went round corners better than most other cars.

Dick ( A long term Saab owner)

Re "Why would she do that when the drawings are freely available on the internet

The written commentary to the first blondihacks video in the vise construction series provides open links to the same public domain drawings, as the underlying basis for her build, and to the MrPete videos.

JR

Apologies to Blondiehacks - I clearly misunderstood something. Possibly what comes of watching Youtube on the TV where there is no access to the comments.

Anyway, I was so impressed by her efforts that I have spent a couple of days making my own from odds and ends in the workshop:

The clamp is adapted from a strange thing that I bought from a stand at a vintage fair for a couple of quid and the screw is M12 studding left over from a previous project. The jaws do lie flat but there is some rather over enthusiastic de-burring on the bottom edges . It is a very functional device and I am impressed by the design. Although it looks a bit rickety it really does lock in place.

Rod

We might not like the Chinese political system (I certainly don't) but there head honchos have technical qualifications. Ours are classics scholars and lawyers who have no idea about real industry. Perhaps this has something to do with it.