What is the recommended way to hold threaded galvanised steel rod in a vise so that the thread is not damaged? The rod needs to be cut with a hacksaw. Actually it will be cut in a metal bandsaw, but it's the same question as the bandsaw also has a vise.
I believe I have invented the best way, but I was wondering if there was a "proper" way that a perfectionist engineer might use.
Two pieces of wood to clamp it in the vice.
If I use the bandsaw and the wood comes loose, the bandsaw blade might jam and break, at some considerable cost and inconvenience and danger.
You just puts nuts on it, and clamp the nuts. You need enough clamping force to slightly deform the nuts, so they grip the rod and stop it from turning as you saw.
Perhaps, cut a pair of nuts for the thread so that they can be pinched up in the machine vice. Thread them on, and clamp, then cut. This has the advantage that the nuts act as thread cleaners to the cut ends.
R.
Wind two nuts onto it. Use one nut as the guide for the saw.
Very good. That is the method that I have used. Ideally, use square nuts, but hexagonal nuts work fine. These were cut halfway along a flat, so someone wanted to clamp them in the bandsaw vise with only the points touching the vise. I refused to allow that as it was not secure and risked breaking the bandsaw blade. Sometimes I don't understand the way some "engineers" think.
Then don't use the band saw,use a conventional hack saw.
The rod usually revolves, but that is stopped OK by having a locknut as well. But cutting two nuts halfway through is the best solution I think. (I have hundreds of rods to cut!)
What, I have an expensive metal bandsaw available and I don't use it? How long will it take to make 400 cuts through 5/8" rod with a hacksaw?
My early days in the engineering shop was a block of 1" metal with two nuts either side to lock it into position of the 1" block. The problem with just the two nuts is the nuts dont always end up with their flat edge faces.
But you didn't stipulate 400 pieces. :-P
Aha! Will remember that...
That was my thought...was trying to visualise how it could be made to work.
'Soft jaw' covers for the vice jaws made from aluminium sheet. Every vice should have some. And it's about time they brought back metalwork teaching at school. ;-)
|What is the recommended way to hold threaded galvanised steel rod in a |vise so that the thread is not damaged? |The rod needs to be cut with a hacksaw. Actually it will be cut in a |metal bandsaw, but it's the same question as the bandsaw also has a |vise. | |I believe I have invented the best way, but I was wondering if there |was a "proper" way that a perfectionist engineer might use.
What I was taught in the Apprentice School, long long ago. Drill a hole a piece of sheet which is several threads deep, tap with the appropriate thread. Hacksaw through the tapped hole. Put your threaded rod through the tapped hole, hold the sheet in the vice.
IIRC I still have the screw clamps I made there unfortunately, Whitworth or BFS & BA. The ones they made us make had several tapped holes in a line, sawn through and a large hole with 1/8 of metal round it to make the clamp flexible enough to allow threaded rod to be inserted.
Hope that is understandable ;-)
It's best to use *three* nuts. Lock 2 of them together and put the 3rd nut further along the shaft. Clamp the middle and third nuts in the vice - with the first nut just outside the jaws, so it doesn't matter if the flats don't line up.
When cutting a threaded bar or bolt, you should always have a nut on it anyway - so that subsequently removing the nut will clean up the threads where the cutting process may have damaged them.
several nuts locked together.
But I did say a "perfectionist engineer", who of course would use the best method for even just one cut :)
I'd recommend using a hand grinder with a metal disc. They're quite cheap these days.
Just be sure to wear eye protection and remember that whatever you grind will be hot afterwards.
That works fairly well except that in the bandsaw there is only a tiny gap between the vise and the blade. Enough for a quarter locknut perhaps. I could put a locknut at the other end of the vise, but that won't work when the rod gets short.
Agreed.
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