New Old Stock Starret vises

[dundeeshopnut]

With the front jaw fixed, it would make it difficult to hold long part that would otherwise hang down in front of the bench, no?

 

[Andy FitzGibbon]

In my opinion however the ability of the vise to rotate to all angles is a huge benefit and in most cases an example of someone inventing a newer and better mouse trap long after the old school manufacturers abandoned making vises here in the USA.

All of the Asian "double swivel" vises are a knock off of the Sawyer "NuTyp" vise, made by the Oswego Tool Co. of Oswego, NY (and others... it's a convoluted history):

Fulton Machine & Vise Co. - History | VintageMachinery.org

For being imports, they are surprisingly tough. I've seen several that were abused in fab shops for many years and are still functional.

 

[adammil1]

All of the Asian "double swivel" vises are a knock off of the Sawyer "NuTyp" vise, made by the Oswego Tool Co. of Oswego, NY (and others... it's a convoluted history):

Fulton Machine & Vise Co. - History | VintageMachinery.org

For being imports, they are surprisingly tough. I've seen several that were abused in fab shops for many years and are still functional.

View attachment 417307

Wow that is cool I never knew that design went back so far. I wonder why that design never took off back in the day? You had Athol, Starrett (probably the same) Parker and several others all copying each other and making the same style of vise which in my opinion is nowhere near as good as the swivel type above. All the old shops were full of the Parker style of vice. I've never seen an old Nutyp in any old shop out there. Has anyone here seen one out there?

I wonder why it wasn't until the Chinese discovered then that we started seeing that type of vise become popular? Is there any situation where the older design is better than the rotating barrel vise?

I personally love being able to hold the work at any and all angles. It comes in very handy for doing pipe work and all sorts of stuff.

 

[john.k]

The vises on the price list are quite small ........the design has the same fault as the Wilton ....Having used one of the rotary Chineseiums ,I still prefer my Dawns ,which are of traditional box slide design.

 

[Greg Menke]

Reed in the basement, Prentice outside on the workbench. I have a Wilton clone in the shop- I fit a pair of snazy 7076 jaws on it because it seemed the thing to do but it would be the last one I'd beat on. Now that Prentice on the other hand... somebody just hand me the sledge and we'll get after it.

 

[john.k]

No hammering on vices in my shop ....if you want to bend something,use the hydraulic press,.......hammering always loosens the jaw screws,and nothing POs me like loose vice jaws......maybe welding the jaws back in might PO me more.

 

[Andy FitzGibbon]

Wow that is cool I never knew that design went back so far. I wonder why that design never took off back in the day? You had Athol, Starrett (probably the same) Parker and several others all copying each other and making the same style of vise which in my opinion is nowhere near as good as the swivel type above. All the old shops were full of the Parker style of vice. I've never seen an old Nutyp in any old shop out there. Has anyone here seen one out there?

I wonder why it wasn't until the Chinese discovered then that we started seeing that type of vise become popular? Is there any situation where the older design is better than the rotating barrel vise?

I personally love being able to hold the work at any and all angles. It comes in very handy for doing pipe work and all sorts of stuff.

Good question. Fulton/Sawyer/Oswego seems to have gone through a lot of ownership changes and financial strife, so perhaps they just never produced enough NuTyp vises to get people interested in them. I've seen a few, but they are pretty rare.

 

[Clive603]

Good question. Fulton/Sawyer/Oswego seems to have gone through a lot of ownership changes and financial strife, so perhaps they just never produced enough NuTyp vises to get people interested in them. I've seen a few, but they are pretty rare.

Swindens in the UK have been producing vices of that style for many years. https://swindens.co.uk/ . Very high quality and eye wateringly expensive in the eyes of ordinary folk but they seem to have an adequate market in the professional world from folk who need that sort of thing.

The Swinden split body and clamp system would seem to give a better grip in the rotational axis than the push bolt set up the imports use.

The positional versatility comes at a price in ultimate robustness and ability to stand up to hammer abuse. If I really wanted to lean on something I'd put a spacer between the unused jaws to minimise bending loads on the sliding body. Even then the relatively lighter construction, aka merely darn heavy rather than really, really, 'kin heavy, in the larger sizes reduces the effectiveness of heavy hammer blows. No substitute for large mass and high inertia when doing serious bashing.

The normal vice design is often criticised for slack between the ram and body. Unfairly in my view because a bit of slack allows the jaws to self align when gripping ordinary, un-machined, things that are a bit out of square. Certainly the seriously rattling fit of my 5 1/2" Record is frequently handy to give a decent length of grip on stuff where an accurate toolmaker or milling vice fit would only hold on a point or three.

Concerning positioning versatility I was intrigued enough by the built up vice on a tilting, twisting, mount shown a year or four back by the incredibly irritatingly perky Jason of Fireball Tools to sort out some laser cut parts and tube ready to make a couple in conjunction with a friend. It might actually happen one day.

Clive

 

[Conrad Hoffman]

I've always wanted a sliding rear jaw vise, but they're pricy. Orcan in India makes what appear to be nice ones, but no easy way to get one that doesn't risk your funds or cost a mint in shipping.

https://www.indiamart.com/orcanproducts/rear-jaw-sliding-bench-vice.html

 

[MrStretch]

As a clock restorer I often need to clamp oddly shaped parts using just one side of the jaws, so the parallelism of the jaws with clamping pressure is very important. It should be able to hold the work to withstand filing and the like without cocking or jamming. I wore out a Polish made dovetail vise in a year or two and have been using a 2" Wilton bullet vise for 15 years or so and it's still as nice as ever.
Testing a vise by measuring how much you need to abuse it until it breaks is silly. What really matters is whether it can hold for what you need to get done. If you have to hammer on a vise to get it to hold, there are other problems.

 

[pan60]

Testing a vise by measuring how much you need to abuse it until it breaks is silly. What really matters is whether it can hold for what you need to get done. If you have to hammer on a vise to get it to hold, there are other problems.

i want to know the vice i get can take some abuse so i dont think testing is silly.
i have worked as a mechanic and in the working on diffeant thing broke vices.

 

[adammil1]

As a clock restorer I often need to clamp oddly shaped parts using just one side of the jaws, so the parallelism of the jaws with clamping pressure is very important. It should be able to hold the work to withstand filing and the like without cocking or jamming. I wore out a Polish made dovetail vise in a year or two and have been using a 2" Wilton bullet vise for 15 years or so and it's still as nice as ever.
Testing a vise by measuring how much you need to abuse it until it breaks is silly. What really matters is whether it can hold for what you need to get done. If you have to hammer on a vise to get it to hold, there are other problems.

On the other hand try working in a shop that works with large high pressure NPT fittings say in the 2" size. We make machines at work that run what's essentially paint thinner at 2000psig the pressure and fluid wash out whatever sealant you use with time and cause leaks. If your assemblers aren't putting everything together with 5ft cheater bars. For certain types of work a vise must be strong.

On the other hand this issue can be avoided. Most of my designs don't have such issues as I almost always insist on using SAE threads or anything else but NPT on machines I specify and the guys working on my stuff think highly of me. However I see a lot of people using NPT as it's cheaper and easier in some cases to get. None the less in most cases I stand by the fact that it is an inferior thread.

 

[john.k]

Seen a great many fails of hydraulic stuff where SAE threads were mixed up with NPT ,and the mechanics didnt bother to find out why the fittings were loose .

 

[G-ManBart]

No hammering on vices in my shop ....if you want to bend something,use the hydraulic press,.......hammering always loosens the jaw screws,and nothing POs me like loose vice jaws......maybe welding the jaws back in might PO me more.

If you aren't hammering on stuff in vises, the lack of a dynamic jaw support (Wilton) doesn't matter. Wilton designed their vise to keep the screw clean from chips/swarf while holding things in a machine shop, not to hold stuff being bashed with a hammer.

I stopped counting vises after fixing/restoring 300 of them. I've got a couple of Wiltons, a couple of Reeds, a Rock Island (Craftsman markings), a Yost and a Parker left that will last me forever, so I like all kinds of different brands.

By far the Athol/Starret family had the largest dynamic jaw supports of all the vintage vises if folks want something that will take more abuse (not that I'd recommend that).

The old chipping vises (9" jaws typically) are what the Fireball vise is essentially recreating from a strength standpoint. Vise manufacturers stopped making them when the demand went away....nobody is doing that sort of work manually any more.

www.mivise.com

 

[G-ManBart]

The NOS Starret vises are pretty uncommon, but $20K is nuts. The swivel jaw examples are probably worth $1K+ to collectors, but the rest should be under that price.

 

[ramsay1]

Wow... I bought a brand new one 32 years ago and still have it.... I should have bought a truck load looks like... Had enough trouble coming up with enough money for one back then.. Cheers from Louisiana; Ramsay 1