Discussion on all milling machines vertical & horizontal, including but not limited to Bridgeports, Hardinge, South Bend, Clausing, Van Norman, including imports.
toddalin wrote:Can the Shars jaws be so soft that brass can cut into them???
Yes, they can be, but you must consider what's really happening.
The jaws are most likely not heat treated.
The brass is being severely work hardened.
With this in mind, perhaps you can understand why I've commented about brass hammers being useless unless you're looking for something spark proof. Brass work hardens readily, so it isn't soft once it's been used as a hammer. It can be repeatedly softened by annealing, but it gets hard again, with use, and will readily dent steel.
Harold
Wise people talk because they have something to say. Fools talk because they have to say something.
I have a kurt 5 in. and a shars 4in. model 440V which is their premium china made vise. I love the kurt but like you it is too heavy and actually too big for my mill. My shars 440V vise is really nice considering the price. My shars vise is the vise that stays on my machine and is used 95 percent of the time. The only time the kurt is used is if I need the extra capacity.
Edit: After looking at the current 440V model I can see they have made some changes the most noticeable is the lead screw on mine is not exposed but on the new one it is exposed so not sure I like that.
No idea of what actual quality those Shars vises are since I've never ordered from nor will I ever deal with Shars. But I can mention about buying cheap vises and what a crap shoot Chinese or off shore vises can be. Most factory alignment issues could be fixed on any milling vise with a surface grinder and some time as long as the vise castings are poured from a quality cast iron. The pair of cheap 4" vises I bought here in Canaduh were anything but that. Even under moderate tightening the fixed jaw was bending and the bed flexing. So even if the internals had been machined, hardened, and then ground as well as Kurt does it (and most of the internals on mine were just left in the as cast condition) the castings were so weak and porous they still would allow the part to tilt due to that bending and flexing. You simply can't fix the castings if there done poorly. Those two cheap vises were an utter waste of money and the lesson I needed. I'll never again try and pinch pennies on inaccurate tooling that replicate those inaccuracy's in every part built with them. At best they might be ok as drill press vises, but not anything I'd use as a proper milling vise. In my opinion mill vises need to be the best you can afford either new or used. Your thread and questions are an excellent idea of asking before buying though Harry.
Glacern has or once had a good reputation as being almost as good as a Kurt and they do offer milling vises in the sizes your interested in. There prices have taken a jump lately and now there's really not much difference between them and a comparable Kurt if you shop the Enco/Kurt sales. And I'm saying that while now owning 3 of the 6" size Glacern vises. But there's also at least one Youtube video that raises some real questions about exactly where those Glacern vises originate from if you do some searching for a video titled The Paint Puzzle!!?? posted by 10ckcr4ck3r
One way or another I don't think it's now possible to get anything that's accurate, well made, dependable, and that has a semi decent life span without paying very close to what a Kurts worth at either that new or used price. Way more than a Kurt if you start looking at the Orange or some of the higher end European vises.
But.....................all this depends on just how heavy duty your average cuts are. A commercial shop has obviously way different requirements than a home shop does. If your not taking huge hogging cuts would a couple of those toolmaker or "screwless" grinding vises work? Some years ago I bought a 4" opening Accu-Pro brand from MSC. I'm more than impressed with it and it checks out on a surface plate well under the 2 10ths it's guaranteed to in every dimension I've checked. No there not quite up to something like a Hermann Schmidt, but there damn close. And Accu Pro apparently holds there bed height tolerances tight enough that ordering a couple would get you a pair of matched vises. Afaik there built up to at least a 7" opening and would fit your lighter weight needs, and at a lot less money for something like a 5" opening size. But I just checked and now don't see the larger opening ones offered at MSC. Maybe they can be found elsewhere.
tornitore45 Hard to explain but here is a picture of a kurt and if you look at where the end of the vise you can see a cap that has been staked on. That is the enclosed lead screw nut and it prevents chips from touching the threads of the leadscrew. My shars 440V is the same way. When I get home from work I will take some close up pictures showing it in more detail.
pete I was about to buy the glacern 4" until I found out that the shars 440V is the same vise made in the same chineese factory as glacerns GSV440. The difference was the shars was 75 dollars cheaper at the time and now I see that glacern has increased their prices significantly making there 4" Chinese vise $150.00 dollars more than the shars. At that rate I would buy a kurt before the glacern.
Whether the Shars & the Glacern are identical.....I don't know.
Seems much of the same machinery & tools, comes out of the same factories in China, but each purchaser, Grizzly, Shars, Glacern, Horror Freight, and many more, have their own manufacturing tolerances that they require them to build to.
So.....the same? They may very well be may be....and maybe not.
I have a Parlec (TE-CO, now) from Taiwan. It works fine, but if I were buying a vise today I would go ahead and get a Kurt. The price difference is not that great, and it's not like you buy a vise every month. And you never know when Enco is going to have one of their insane sales.
SteveHGraham wrote: And you never know when Enco is going to have one of their insane sales.
My timing was outstanding. The recession had hit pretty hard, and things (apparently) weren't selling all that well. Enco ran one of their promotional ads whereby I could buy a Kurt (I think a 688), delivered, for $328. I was in need, as I had added the Haas CNC mill to my shop. I'm shocked at the asking price today.
Harold
Wise people talk because they have something to say. Fools talk because they have to say something.
I managed to pick up a 3" Kurt at a pretty reasonable price ($150) on ebay (I have seen them go for over $300 - more than a 6" vise because they are no longer being made).
Then, I saw another vise, not listed as a Kurt, but that had all the same casting numbers on it, so I took a chance and got it for $50. When I compared the castings, they were identical, down to minute marks probably from the pattern.
When I get access to a larger surface plate and then a surface grinder, I'd like to check them and grind them to match, if needed.
I know Harold and others don't like swivel bases, but I'd like to get at least one, as I can't mount the Kurt lengthwise on the Pratt & Whitney mill because it has only a single slot.
