• Hi all and welcome to TheWoodHaven2 brought into the 21st Century, kicking and screaming! We all have Alasdair to thank for the vast bulk of the heavy lifting to get us here, no more so than me because he's taken away a huge burden of responsibility from my shoulders and brought us to this new shiny home, with all your previous content (hopefully) still intact! Please peruse and feed back. There is still plenty to do, like changing the colour scheme, adding the banner graphic, tweaking the odd setting here and there so I have added a new thread in the 'Technical Issues, Bugs and Feature Requests' forum for you to add any issues you find, any missing settings or just anything you'd like to see added/removed from the feature set that Xenforo offers. We will get to everything over the coming weeks so please be patient, but add anything at all to the thread I mention above and we promise to get to them over the next few days/weeks/months. In the meantime, please enjoy!

Parkinson Perfect no. 14 vice restoration.

Mike G

Petrified Pine
Joined
Jul 30, 2014
Messages
10,621
Reaction score
448
Location
Suffolk
Name
Mike
I spotted a vice on Facebook a day or two ago, and bought it for £30. It's a Parkinson Perfect, with QR. I am sure I read somewhere once that this was the first vice with QR..........although, I could have just plucked that from thin air. It was in OK condition, but seized fairly solid with rust and dried oily sawdust. I couldn't get the QR to release at the seller's house, but it screwed in and out OK-ish.

Anyone looking for Wallacian levels of shininess is very much in the wrong thread. This is to be a restoration back to working condition, rather than to museum-condition. Here it is in the "before" state:

IMG_7508.jpg

IMG_7509.jpg

IMG_7510.jpg

IMG_7511.jpg

As you can see, it doesn't look too bad at all.

The first job (after taking the photos), was obviously to dis-assemble. It offered little resistance:

IMG_7512.jpg

IMG_7513.jpgIMG_7514.jpg

Initially I used a paint scraper to hoik off the main bits of gunk, and scrape at the rust:

IMG_7514.jpg

I moved on to a wire brush, and then sand-paper:

IMG_7515.jpg

I did this clean-up entirely dry, other than a wipe over the front face with white spirit. The moving parts and screws were cleaned up on my bench-grinder-wire-brush. The cleaning revealed that it had originally been a red colour, and that paint was impressively robust. I managed to pick and scrape the spilled modern paint off it quite easily, but there was a creamy-white hard substance on the face which I assume to be putty, which was more difficult. I've done the best I can with just picking at it, but I'm wondering whether I might usefully soak the remnants overnight in white spirit and see if it comes off more easily tomorrow.

The only thing which required replacing was a broken split-pin on the back end of the screw shaft. Here it is an hour or two later, re-assembled, in all its glory:

IMG_7516.jpg

IMG_7517.jpg

IMG_7518.jpg



IMG_7519.jpg


As to why I need another vice.............I don't. This is a gift for my son-in-law. I'm about to build him a bench (in Sweden), and a vice like this, if it ever came up for sale, would cost £150 to £200. I know we whinge a bit about the price of second hand tools here, but when you look at Swedish prices, even for Sandvik products, we really shouldn't ever moan again.
 
Last edited:
Nice. It's satisfying to bring something like that back into good order, isn't it.

For the bits of putty, you could try heat. I've never needed to try this myself but I've seen it recommended when trying to clear old, hard putty off window frames.

As for the origin of the quick release vice, you might be recalling the lengthy posts by Nick (Nabs) back on the other forum.

He gathered his research notes together on his blog:

 
That’s going to take a chunk of your baggage allowance.
I've had to book hold luggage....and this takes about 9kg of it. Room for a tenon saw, and some small gardening tools. I suspect security will take a close look!
 
Very nice. It is rewarding doing things for our offspring and plus ones.
 
Nice work Mike but unless you have already done it give it a good test to make sure that it doesn't jump out of grip due to a worn "hook" in the form of the thread.
I do this by over tightening at various positions.
I'd hate you to go to all the transportation malarky to find a problem.
Cheers, Andy
 
Nice save Mike and a worthy cause. (y)
I have it's twin fitted as an end vice, had it for donkey's years also it's bigger brother which I showed restoring a few years ago,
They work very well though both of mine have a little backlash.
 

Attachments

  • 14.JPG
    14.JPG
    189.8 KB · Views: 3
  • 15.JPG
    15.JPG
    198.9 KB · Views: 2
Perfect!
Re hold storage on aircraft, I wanted to take 6 x 36” Record sash cramps packed in a box as part of my hold allowance to the us, well I thought I had better check and rang the airline and got through to a complete divvy who had never heard of sash cramps, so I tried to describe them and got a definite no! But they’re not that much different to Golf clubs says I, Mr no imagination on the other end wasn’t having any of it. I didn’t want to risk it after that so they are waiting till we bring a container over in a couple of years.
But I did risk all my spindle blocks and cutters + a Euro style bridge guard for my planer. About 22 kg’s worth! Not a murmur. So I’m sure you will be fine with that.
Ian
Ps, no sign of it being opened by security etc.
 
Nice save Mike and a worthy cause. (y)
I have it's twin fitted as an end vice, had it for donkey's years also it's bigger brother which I showed restoring a few years ago,
They work very well though both of mine have a little backlash.
Interesting that yours was definitely painted blue, and mine was red.
 
Nice work Mike but unless you have already done it give it a good test to make sure that it doesn't jump out of grip due to a worn "hook" in the form of the thread.
I do this by over tightening at various positions.
I'd hate you to go to all the transportation malarky to find a problem.
Cheers, Andy

That's a good reminder, Andy. I'll have a closer look tomorrow. I tightened it up and all was well, but that only at the "closed" position, and I didn't over-do it. I'll put it through a more testing procedure.
 
Nice refurb Mike, excellent. I did the same with my Granddad's. It looked good but was very sloppy indeed. I gave it to my brother, I wish I hadn't.

Do you know aything about the idea that they used to throw the female part of the thread into the fire to melt it and re-cast? I can't remember where I got that from but it was a very long time ago indeed.
 
Interesting that yours was definitely painted blue, and mine was red.
I can't remember where I got it Mike it's so long ago but it's quite possible it had been repainted by a previous owner. I much prefer the unfinished look of the 15 so might strip it down one day and see if any traces of red.
 
Nicely done Mike. My only vice is a Record 52 1/2 and I had to refurb it like you are doing with yours. One thing you could do now, as a matter of urgency, given Autumn chills (and condensation) is coat and buff the vice rails with wax. The moving jaw will slide easier, but, more importantly, the freshly exposed surface you created with wire brush etc will flash rust quicker than whatever.
 
+1 to the above.
I would also suggest wiping over the nice clean cast iron parts with some boiled linseed oil, thinned down a bit with white spirit. Let it dry for half an hour or so and wipe off any excess. It's quicker and easier than paint and will preserve the nice old appearance. It's what I did with my own vice.
 
This ^ has triggered a memory. My first wife's (died) father used to have a small factory that did sand castings amongst other things. Once the castings had been machined to get the nibs etc off, they would dunk them in hot engine oil for a while, then polish them with silvering or blacking. No idea what these polishes were made of but the castings were not painted and didn't rust.
 
Nicely done Mike. My only vice is a Record 52 1/2 and I had to refurb it like you are doing with yours. One thing you could do now, as a matter of urgency, given Autumn chills (and condensation) is coat and buff the vice rails with wax. The moving jaw will slide easier, but, more importantly, the freshly exposed surface you created with wire brush etc will flash rust quicker than whatever.
I never have any rust issues in my workshop. I'll wipe it over once it's installed in Sweden.
 
Lovely job mike, I much prefer a thing in its working clothes these days. Shows its had a life so to speak.
 
Back
Top