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View Full Version : How would a neander cut this?



Mitch Barker
05-03-2009, 10:41 PM
I'm making wooden faces for my "Record" style metal vise. I want to mortise the backs of the wooden faces so the metal face of the vise is inset into the wood. Essentially, the mortise has the same shape as a mortise for a hinge, except that it measures 9"x3"x3/8".

After marking it out, should I use a handsaw to make cross grain cuts every inch or so. Of course the saw cuts would only be full depth at the open end of the mortise. Then use a chisel to pop out the pieces. I'm afraid there may be a lot of tear out yb chiseling cros grain. (The wood is goncalo alves)

Even if the above procedure removes some material, how do I get it down to the final depth, ensuring it is even? This surface must lay flat against the metal vise face.

Thanks for any advise.

Mitch

Bill Houghton
05-03-2009, 11:07 PM
but, lacking that, take a large enough piece of wood to span the mortise and drive a screw into it so that the head sticks up by the depth of the mortise. Use that to determine when you've excavated far enough. Suggestion: excavate in rows, with space between. Once you've got those even, remove the intervening "hills" down to your reference depth.

David Gendron
05-03-2009, 11:15 PM
Hi Mitch, what i did for mine, was that, I cut from botom to top cleaned it out and after the vise was in, I precisly added piece to fit the space above the vise. An other way you can do is to do like you said and with your hand saw, when most of the cut is done, dig the toe of your saw in the top part of the kerf and pull back and with a few passes like that you should be abble to get to the bottom of the cut. After that it's a mather of chiseling the waste living one stip of that waste at 1/3 and 2/3 so you can use a router plane to clean in between the remaining waste strips(they are there to provide suport to the router plane) to the appropriat dept. When everything is bood, just use a paring chisel to cleane carefuly the remaining waste.

Jim Koepke
05-04-2009, 2:12 AM
I would be inclined to cheat. Make a template of the face vice out of a piece of wood the thickness of the metal, then glue it to the wood that will be the face. Thinking backwards sometimes helps.

Otherwise, the router plane mounted on a large base to span the area being worked. Sharp paring chisels would also be a help.

jim

Eric Brown
05-04-2009, 7:04 AM
Make sure that the vice is installed square with the top surface of the bench. A non-square vice can lead to non-square cuts. How do I know? Simple. I have a Tucker vice that adjusts every which way. If I don't hold the work square with the bench I tend to follow the visual references of the bench and a miscut sometimes happens.

As for your problem, you could attach (or clamp) boards top and bottom and use for guiding a router plane as others have mentioned or you could use a rabbet plane.
Now 3/8" may seem like a lot but if you just grab a tool, take your time and just do it, you will be ok. To help with the two ends of the vice cutout, you can saw first. The clean out the waste between. Take lots of light cuts. No need to be aggressive.

Now a question. Are you sure you only want to set the vice back the thickness of the back jaw. Many prefer to either have a layer of wood or leather to protect the workpiece and that requires a deeper cutout. One poster suggested adding a board to the front of the bench and you could make a board such as this that would also cove your rear jaw. Doing this would require a cutout on the board instead of the bench.

Just thoughts. Good luck.

Eric

Ben Davis
05-04-2009, 11:45 AM
I'd highly consider a laminated 2 piece approach. Make the first piece with a through mortise the size of the vice face (think picture frame). Then glue up an appropriate size face. You've got a perfect fit and you can make the face as large as you can find a piece of wood.

You can vary the thickness of the picture frame piece to your needs... also provides a little bit of wiggle room.

David Gendron
05-04-2009, 12:09 PM
I like Jim's idea, I think it make a lot of sens

Floyd Washburn
05-05-2009, 8:41 AM
If you want it dead on, then you could do it like I have pillar bedded a rifle action and barrel. Dig out the mortise beyond the needed depth. Apply a mold release to all surfaces that you don't want stuck in epoxy. Then put epoxy in the mortise. I've used Devcon for rifles. Then set the vise in the mortise and epoxy, and wait for it to cure.

That's the general procedure. The problem to solve is a method to hold the vise in the epoxy in the wooden face. It maybe the screws (with mold release on them). I know its cheating, but it can be dead on when you're done.