The Post (or Leg) Vise
Last Revised: 6/28/2008
My first post vise
Above you can see one of the first post vises that I have collected and mounted over the years. Note the yardstick standing up against the vise for scale.
I have paid as little as $20 for one and as much as $60.
The weights vary from as little as 35 pounds to as much as about 75 pounds.
I have collected about 5 post vises over the years. I know this isn't much of a collection, having seen places where guys have 20 or 30 of them!
My 2 installed post vises (and 5 other stands I made) are mounted on bases that are 215 pound New Holland model 66 hay baler flywheels (particulars on demand). One of the holes in the flywheel is just right for the post vise leg.
However you mount your post vise, consider this:
A well known blacksmith, Peter Sevin, demonstrated at our spring conference in 2007. He wanted to bend some heavy material, but the temporary mount for the post vise allowed the vise to rotate. To this he said: "I like to have at least one place in the shop that has an immovable object!"
I have used post vises at many sites that wiggle around, rotate, are top heavy and/or have no place to lay tools. You have to make a decision between portability and stability. If you will use most "portable" post vises on a dirt floor, the floor will NEVER be level enough to keep it from rocking when hot rasping, for instance.
As I said before, my vises mount on 215 pound baler flywheels. The things come apart into 3 pieces; the vise, the vertical 3" pipe stand, which (for the future) has a 3/8" thick, 18" square table with 1 1/2" high sides on 3 sides, welded to the top of the pipe and a curcular mounting flange welded to the bottom, and finally, the flywheel. I can handle the whole thing myself (age 68) with a 2 X 6 to use to roll the flywheel into the van.
A Friend recently bought a Harbor Frieght "skyhook" for about $50 that mounts on the tail of his pickup truck box. He uses that to hoist his "portable" stuff aboard.
If I need to really "wrench" on a part in this post vise, I have made a bar that hooks into the stand that allows me to pull the work and the bar together, like tightening a bolt with 2 wrenches. This works out very well when I put my HF "mini- hossfeld" bender in the vise to use it.
Finally, no one said that you can have only one post vise.
If there is room, have a portable one that you can move around, close to the anvil and a permanent one on a heavy bench.
Here are some pictures of the various parts of the vise. Note that I already burned off part of the hub on the flwheel so it would set flat on the floor. Some models don't have that hub sticking out far enough that you need to cut it off. Note that these pictures are from a different vise than the one at the top of this page.
Flywheel, Bottom view
Flywheel, Top view
Stand
Vise In Use
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