I was first prompted to produce this item as an article for the Model Engineers' Workshop Magazine after following a thread on the Model Engineering/Model Engineers' Workshop forum. This was titled, “When is a precision vice not a precision vice” The reason for the title being that a vice had been purchased that did not have the quality expected. Precision, of course, is on its own meaningless, it depends on the trade. For a bricklayer, 5mm may well be considered precision.
Because of this, I would ask, in the metal machining trades, say aero engines , precision is probably 0.01mm and better, but does the average home workshop owner really need to equip his or her workshop to that level?
Why then did this prompt me to produce this item. Well, most were saying that the purchaser should be prepared to spend more and obtain a genuine high quality vice. Unfortunately, such comments so often loose site of the fact that many are setting up a workshop on a very limited budget, if not, why are so many mini milling machines being sold. Of course, occasionally it may be a space, but almost certainly, mostly financial.
It was though a comment by the editor of the magazine that brought me to this point.
He stated that the workshop owner should be prepared to pay the price for a quality
vice and if the finance was just not available be prepared to purchase a budget vice,
dismantle it, then re-
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