workbench mods

[John A.]

Slight tooling change.

The 4" vise jaws are only 3/4" tall. This is OK for some of the stuff I would be working on, but I'm not going to pay a fortune to buy a vise with bigger jaws.

Least not when I can make bigger jaws myself for about $4 and some change from a big piece of Aluminum.





I used the mill to make a groove so it would help hold round objects that I will likely be working on often in place better. I also drilled and countersunk the holes enough so the screws that would be holding them in place won't come into contact with my work piece.



And afterwards, I shot it with a nice thick coat of flex seal to give the jaws a softer feel so they won't damage the finish of a workpiece as quickly or easily too.

 

[MikeD]

How did it go milling that groove on the new setup?

 

[John A.]

It went pretty good. And faster than the old one too.

There is a bit more flex in the setup than I was wanting though. Which I am optimistically cautious about milling hard steel(s) with it. Aluminum did pretty good though.

I can probably remove a lot more of the flex by tightening all of the bolts on the carriage and the milling table. But that will also make it harder to turn and slower to advance.

But I think that's where most of the flex was coming from.

 

[CaddmannQ]

I might suggest you disassemble that new slide assy & check the whole thing for good de-burring around the holes and machined surfaces.

I have bought new tools and new guns and new vehicles which had burrs and chips, left-behind during assembly.

In the case of my motorcycle, a burr left behind on the drive shaft universal joint yoke caused the yoke to be pressed off center a few thousands of an inch when the bearings were installed.

The Factory balanced the shaft like that and installed it on my motorcycle. So it didn't vibrate much but neither was it straight. Also one axis of the joint was too tight, due to that burr, causing it to overheat.

Savage ships their guns with the bolt loose. 2 out of 3 of my new Savage guns had minor burrs on the bolts, and both had steel chips in the packaging and in the bolt package.

Any how these things can throw your assembly off by a couple thousandths of an inch and drive you nuts.

 

[CaddmannQ]

By the way, Kawasaki replaced hundreds of driveshafts under warranty for this exact problem.

In 10 years, I never saw anywhere online a description of why there was a problem, except for the one that you just read which I first wrote 10 years ago.

Anyhow, the lack of proper inspection and deburring cost them a fortune in the motorcycle part of their business. But that part is peanuts compared to their core business, which is huge marine/diesel engines.

A smaller company might have gone bankrupt from such an error, but Kawasaki muscles on, unfazed.

 

[Bobster]

I think you have figured out the "problem" with the drill press vise you are using is that it is not "self-tightening" as a larger and much more expensive Kurt (or similar) would be. By making larger jaws, you are increasing the mechanical advantage of the part being clamped to want to go over square. As in, the harder you clamp, the wider the jaws get at the top versus the bottom (of the vise). I know this because I have slightly larger versions of what you have on my mill/drill and have the same "issue" but am limited to a smaller vise (vs the Kurt) because of the size of the table. I have been making do as will you...

Pics show my "regular" vise off the table and how I mount it. I think those are 7/16" bolts that go in the table slots. I have various jaws I can swap out for various types of processes but I mainly use the m/d to slot alum. The vise on the m/d is ready to be bolted down and squared in prep for milling 45^ off the ends of some small pieces to make a "ramp".

I do have a couple vises just like yours I use on the welding table to hold parts for welding. They are about $16 at Lowe's.

 

[John A.]

Thanks caddman. I had the table apart when I first got it. It's pretty much all cast parts. Mostly aluminum. Except for the cross bolts/nuts.

Bobster, I like your vises. And the jaws you made for them.

I think I paid about $18 for the simple 4" vise. It was nothing extravagant. Long as it holds what I'm working on, is all that matters. But with just 1x4" of surface, had some room for improvement.

A lot of what I will be working on, will not be very large. 2 inches or less most of the time, unless I do an 80% lower or something, would be larger.

I have a much larger (and cast iron) xy cross slide vise, but I don't think I'd want to use it on my lathe.

If anything, I could probably make a dedicated milling station by using the new xy compound table with the bench press. In all honesty, it may would have more precise travel if I did because it would eliminate all of the "flex" from my carriage on the lathe. But, I can tighten the tension screws on the ways and remove much, or nearly all of the flex if I spend a little time with it.