Hey, been looking at vises, they sure are proud of 'um. I'm kinda new at wood butchering.....How do the imports of Taiwan & India stack up? Hartville has one of each. Leaning towards this one. Anyone ever deal w/ Hartville?
I bought a white Shop Fox vise, a Record knock-off, from Grizzly. It hasn't been mounted to a bench yet, but it's solid, has survived a whole year on my basement floor without rusting, and it has a pop-up dog on the face. Hafta wait to see how it works when attached to the bench, but I'm confident it's as good as the expensive ones.
I've seen these here in Australia, well made and worth the money. If I didn't already have a record No 52 I'd get one of those.
in a real large size like the Record 53, but for the size they are the smoothest operating vise I've played with. Especially the quick release. Much easier to use than my Record 53.
Cheers, Eric
I played with this one at Woodcraft too, but liked this Wilton better. Maybe it's just how they were set up, but the Wilton was silky-smooth to use. 'Course, it ain't cheap, but I figgure I'm not buying a trainload of 'em.
that same wilton can be had at lowes for 99 dollars.
skeez
Kewl. I hadn't noticed that.. :)
they do not have em set up on display but most lowes stores have a couple in boxes under the display of the other vises. the threaded rods on these vises are inside steel channel so they get very little dust on the mechanism. skeez
questionable. I have a Record bench vise and very pleased (they are cast in England). Record makes several vise sizes. USA-made and Germany-made vises are usually quite good.
I have that Wilton, but don't have it on a bench yet. May put it on a downdraft sanding table I plan to build.
Another good source is eBay. I have an old (circa 1920s by best guesstimate) Morgan vise that I happened upon for free. It's built like a Mack truck. I see them on eBay from time to time, and would not hesitate to pick one up if I needed another vise. This is one solid hunk of iron.
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