My new bench has been patiently waiting to be completed until yesterday. Santa brought my the finishing touch. An Inset vise and a Pair of bench dogs from Lee Valley.
Installation was basically easy, A Plunge router made short work of it, it would have taken a bit longer with non tailed tools but there is nothing fancy in the installation. I would say between installing the vise and drilling the 17 dog holes with my 2101 brace it took about 3 hours... I wasn't really keeping track.
This morning I got my first impressions. I have some drawer bottom blanks that I ripped down to 5/8th on the table saw leaving the middle third to be scrubbed off. So I went to work scrubbing. Both the bench and the vice worked wonderfully. It did what it is supposed to do. taking heavy cuts in Maple the piece never slipped or moved... it has been so long sense I have had a proper bench that it is such a joy to work on a solid work surface with proper vises.
My only complaint with the vise is that I can see that there is definite possibility that shavings and chips could jam up the shuttle.
The dog on the vise itself is simply held in place by 2 pins and can be lifted and moved with no tools. I would guess that odd or different sized dogs could easily be made.
I cna't think of anything else to mention at the moment so if anyone has any questions please feel free to ask. I have not seen anyone else pos a review on this vise so I thought sense i now have one I would throw this up. here are some pics.