Restoring Paramo No 6 Vise

[loply]

Hi folks,

Was out my local car boot on Sunday when I happened upon this impractically large old British vise, a Paramo No 6, about 35kg by my reckoning, 6 inch wide jaws that open out to around 9 inches!

I offered the bloke £8 and walked (well, hobbled...) away with the thing in a carrier bag.

Here it is - nice and rusty but no cracks or major damage. The handle is kinked and the jaws each have one sheared screw and one seized screw.




And here it is after phase 1 - lots of wire brushing, sanding, and some sandblasting. Got the HammerRite on order to get it looking like new.




Couple of questions I was hoping someone could help with -

1) The main horizontal "sliding surface" on the mobile part has been used as an anvil/grinding deck in places, but the original flycutter marks are visible in others. I'm tempted to skim 1mm off the whole thing with a carbide face mill to get it like new. This would mean I'd have to shim the underside to keep the thing right though. Would it be hardened / would I be foolish to put some (say) 1mm stainless strips on the underside as a shim/gib? I'd probably epoxy them to the existing part. I would hate to bugger up a vise that has probably been in service for 50 years!

2) I put the handle in my (comparatively puny) 4 inch Record and did my best to straighten it, but it's ended up a bit of a snakey shape now. Can I just knock up a new one from a piece of mild steel or threaded rod (after I've turned off the threads!), or are these usually made of a harder metal?

Thanks for any tips on the above. Will post pics of the finished thing.

Lastly, I want to finish restoring this thing but if anybody feels they have a real need/use for such a large vice feel free to make me an offer for swaps. I'd be happy to keep it but really it's a bit wasted on me. I'm not after cash but if you've any milling accessories or a 240v 3 phase motor going spare I'd be happy to deal!

[andyf]

I reckon it's a keeper, Loply. I have two engineer's vices: 4" and 6", both Records. It isn't often that the larger one is really needed,  but I wouldn't be without it.

Yours is obviously cast iron, so skimming it down shouldn't be a problem. But if it works as it is, I wouldn't bother fixing it, or worry about the handle, as long as you can get it to slide from end to end through its housing. 

However, on googling 6" vices, the first result (Amazon) shows a new Record for £225 + £19 delivery, so I can understand the temptation to tart it up and sell it on.

I offered the bloke £8 and walked (well, hobbled...) away with the thing in a carrier bag.

That must be some carrier bag, if the handles didn't stretch 

Andy

[75Plus]

You might give some thought to what will happen to the lead screw/nut alignment if you shim up from the bottom. You might consider a brass "wear plate" installed above the slide.

Joe

[loply]

You might give some thought to what will happen to the lead screw/nut alignment if you shim up from the bottom. You might consider a brass "wear plate" installed above the slide.

Joe

You're exactly right, that didn't cross my mind, but if I skim the top then shim the bottom to compensate, the screw will end up too high for the nut.

I'm considering whether to get a thin plate of O1 tool steel and bond it to the top after hardening it. There's no 'real' need - it's mainly cosmetic.

One question about these type of vises - There are machined 'sliding' surfaces on the top, sides and bottom of the stationary part, but the mobile part is not tall enough to contact the top of the stationary part. I guess its' about 1mm short, meaning it's quite sloppy. I presume it's been designed like this but can't decide whether I should try to eliminate this slop by the method above.

Cheers,
Rich

[John Hill]

You might find that if you lift the slide by putting a plate under it you will be easily able to lift the nut at the same time.  The last vise I looked in the nut had a lug that engaged with a hole in the base casting, obviously it would be just as happy engaging with a hole in your raising plate.

Cheers

[loply]

You might find that if you lift the slide by putting a plate under it you will be easily able to lift the nut at the same time.  The last vise I looked in the nut had a lug that engaged with a hole in the base casting, obviously it would be just as happy engaging with a hole in your raising plate.

Cheers

The 'nut' appears to be part of the casting which has been drilled and tapped somehow.

[AdeV]

I don't think the top surface is supposed to be any kind of reference surface. I've never owned a vice where it's a tight fit through the  base with the top surface doing any work; it's always been the bottom surface that takes the weight.

This sort of vice isn't a precision instrument, it's just a general purpose workholding machine I suspect if you took a minimum skim off the top just to tidy it up, that'd be plenty good enough, I wouldn't bother shimming or otherwise attempting to turn it into a precision tool.

[75Plus]

Here is a link to "everything you need to know about bench vises" on another forum. It runs 11 pages and has lots of good information.

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=62716

Joe

[loply]

Both vice jaws had one screw sheared off and the other seized solid.

I got the jaws off by slipping a hacksaw blade behind them and sawing the remaining screws off.

I then had to redrill and retap the holes. I wanted to maintain the same spacing so that aftermarket jaws could be bought if desired, and the original ones reused in the meantime. This meant enlarging the holes from whatever they were (around 8mm) to M10.

Some rather creative workholding was required.



 By my reckoning that mill block must be around 70kg (!) and nearly killed me getting it on the table without breaking anything. Probably not good for the mill really but needs must. I bought it with intentions of chopping it up into various smaller blocks!

End result was that, with some careful and slow drilling I managed to keep the drill on center and remove the remaining screw bits. I've usually struggled drilling out sheared screws, I find the bit wanders and you end up with oval holes, but I managed this time. I applied the quill lock partially for extra rigidity, and used the biggest permissible center drill to it's full depth.



Next step is to machine the jaws back to true and then some paint and we're done!

[loply]

Hi folks,

Finished with the vise. Sanded / sandblasted / body fillered the thing, got it all painted in Hammerite Hammered Blue, which just came out metallic rather than hammered and now it's good to go.




That's a full size screw driver by the way - the jaws are open about 9 inches.

I had to skim the face of the (hardened!) jaws with a carbide face mill as they were badly convex, Also had to make some custom slotted screws as normal M10 countersunk screws were too big for the jaw countersunk area, which I couldn't enlarge as it was too hard.



And that's it! Will keep it for a few weeks and see if it's so big it gets in the way or not!

[krv3000]

hi and a good job

[Stilldrillin]

Nicely restored Loply! 

I've never seen a 6" one that size before...... 

David D