Getting jaws off an old vise

oldbrownhat

oldbrownhat

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I have an old (English-made) Record Nº5 4" vise that works well but the jaws are badly worn. I ordered replacement jaws on Amazon, but the problem is getting the old jaws off. They are secured with slot-head screws but I can't get the screws out.

I've tried applying Kroil overnight, heating with a propane torch and letting cool, tapping with a punch to loosen, and lastly, an impact screwdriver which I ground a tip to the right thickmess, so I'm pretty much out of options and thinking that my last recourse may be to (carefully) drill them out with a slightly smaller bit, maybe just down to the threads in the body at first so I can knock the jaws loose.
 
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You might want to find someone w a acetylene torch set. Poss pay a little to let them get it hot enuf to turn the screws loose. I believe you need more heat to loosen them. Propane not hot enuf. You could buy a small Mapp gas (cheap cost ) small torch that's a
bit hotter than propane that may work better. Then
try the welding shop last. They will come out..
 
fleabus101 said:
You might want to find someone w a acetylene torch set. Poss pay a little to let them get it hot enuf to turn the screws loose. I believe you need more heat to loosen them. Propane not hot enuf. You could buy a small Mapp gas (cheap cost ) small torch that's a
bit hotter than propane that may work better. Then
try the welding shop last. They will come out..
Click to expand...
I have a MAPP gas turbo torch (actually MP Pro now that MAPP hasn't been made for 15 years) and I might be able to heat it enough, but there's a lot of cast iron behind the jaws. A neighbour up the street has oxy-acet. so I could have them apply some serious heat.

But I think I'll try drilling them out first. Can't do the dynamic jaw in the drill press as it's too tall, so I'll just have to mark very carefully and go slow. I have good drill bits, including cobalt so I should be OK as long as I can get a good start.
 
You might try the Kroil again and try just tapping around the screw to set up vibration to wick the Kroil in. Repeat every couple of hours for a day or 2.
 
I've been at muffler shops that make super fast work of stuck studs all the time, they have the expierance to do it correct and quick!!

Ivan
 
If you use a large drill bit you could drill the heads off and remove the jaws. You then are closer to the stuck threads. Kroil, superzilla, or seafoam and heat using vice grips to loosen the screws. If you break them you are onto drilling and retapping.
Good luck.
There is always milling them in place.
 
You could also plug weld a nut onto the head of the screw. Then you could use a box end wrench to unscrew it. The heat of welding plus the extra leverage of the end wrench will probably get it. A Mig welder works best for this if done right, but Tig or stick will work too. Let the welds cool completely before attempting to remove the screws.
 
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Use the neighbors O/A setup and get the old jaw and the vise head itself good and hot..heat the vise head not the screw itself
Stay off of the screw itself directly as it;ll heat to red hot quickly and in that state the metal is extremely soft and pliable.
You can twist the slot right out of the head or the head right off of the screw very easily.

Then you are going to have to drill whats left of the stubs out and drill & tap for new screws.


??...Do the new jaws have screw attachment holes that are in the exact same placement positions as the originals?
If they are not, then go ahead and remove these old ones by any means needed as you will have to D&T for the new ones anyway.
 
Had the same problem years ago.

I used a stubby flathead screwdriver.

I put the flathead in the vise and closed it partially. I then put a couple of large washers on the handle end of the stubby so I could close the vise for pressure and turn the stubby with vise grips.

I applied Kroil the day before.
 
There are no threads in the jaw. That's a thru hole. Threads are in the vice.
 
Thanks for all the ad-vise. Lots of options. I decided to ry drilling the screws out enough to get the jaws off and so far, so good. Now all that remains is to get the remains of the screws out. Now that the screw stubs are exposed, I'm going to let Kroil do its thing for a day or so.

I was able to put the stationary jaw in my drill press. Being slot-head rather than Phillips, and a couple being somewhat mangled, they were a little more difficult to centre punch to start drilling. I ended up using a 1/4" carbide bit from my die grinder to start the hole, initially a tapered one then a ball-end, followed by a 1/4" cobalt drill, then a 3/16". After that I was able to knock the jaws loose with a cold chisel. Those screws were pretty well rusted in.

The dynamic jaw wouldn't fit in the drill press so I had to drill freehand but it still turned out OK. I omitted the 3/16" bit as I realized I only had to drill the flat head off the screw and not go down to the base of the jaw.

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Check that the screws aren't exposed on the back of the vice. I have a vice that has the screws riveted on the back.
 
Another possibility is someone might have been welding on something clamped in the vise and was grounding through the vise. That might have welded the screw threads.
 
gjgalligan said:
Another possibility is someone might have been welding on something clamped in the vise and was grounding through the vise. That might have welded the screw threads.
Click to expand...
Nope- they're just plain "stuck" although the jaw plates were a bit bashed up. The guy I got the vise from was a welder but -perhaps due to having been raised in post-war Britain where they had rationing until 1955 - he tended to buy 2nd or 3rd-hand and'or cheap stuff that was kind of beat up. Plus, the welding table to which it's bolted had been sitting outside for a few years before I got it, which no doubt had contributed to the condition of the screws! Fortunately the vise itself is in excellent shape.

Despite having cheap tools, he was a good welder. His partner, my next-door neighbour, bought him a brand-new Miller MIG and a very nice floor-standing VS drill press, but he never used them and she sold them off a couple of years ago.

I hope to get the screw stubs out later this morning, after being treated with Kroil overnight, and receiving gentle tapping, as SmSgt suggested. The new jaws are Irwin (made in China) but will be quite adequate for my purposes. Perhaps not surprisingly there are several firms in the UK who still make replacement jaw plates for Record vises as they were a very respected brand and there are a lot of them still in use.
 
Nope- blighters won't budge :( Just tried to remove the stubs from the movable jaw and both sheared off, so they'll have to be drilled out. Fortunately it appears the thread is 1/4-20 (likely BSW) rather than something arcane like BA 1, so I can re-tap if I ding the thread. But I'll use a slightly smaller bit which will leave a thin "sleeve" I can pick out.

I may give the static jaw another day of Kroil before tackling it.
 
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