Quick-release eccentric vice

It is impossible to imagine an auto repair shop or home workshop without a bench vise, regardless of what material you have to work with: metal, plastic or wood. Usually, a classic vice with a crank is used everywhere, which slowly clamps and releases parts.
Quick-release eccentric vice

It is absolutely easy and in a short time to make a homemade metal vice with an eccentric clamp, which is compact in size and also allows you to quickly and reliably fix workpieces. The speed of the vice will be especially useful when performing large volumes of work that are characterized by uniformity and monotony.
You can make the simplest metal vice with an eccentric clamp with your own hands from inexpensive scrap materials - leftover scrap metal, which can almost always be found in a home workshop or garage. Therefore, we will not dwell on the materials. If there is a need to specify their features, we will clarify this during the work process.
For work we will need the most common tools:
  • welding machine;
  • grinder with cutting disc;
  • drill press or drill;
  • thread tap:
  • hammer;
  • mites;
  • bench vise, etc.

Let's start making a vice


To make the work go smoothly, it doesn’t hurt to mentally imagine the end result of the work we are just starting: a ready-made quick-clamping eccentric vice, delighting us with its compactness, color variety and amazing ability to quickly and reliably clamp any workpiece.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Well, now let’s get to work so that the dream turns into reality. We find the rest of the useless channel, mark it with a ruler and marker and cut off the required piece using a grinder. It will become the basis for the movable and fixed jaws of our vice.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

From a suitable equal angle corner after marking, we cut off two pieces of equal length, which in a vice will become the base of the jaws of our homemade vice.
Quick-release eccentric vice

In the middle of the shelf of one of the corners - the future movable jaw of the vice - we mark the center of the hole, which we drill on a drilling machine.
Quick-release eccentric vice

On the crosspiece of the channel blank, along its central axis, closer to one end, we mark the boundaries of the slot along which the movable jaw of our vice will move. Mark the marked points and drill holes, which will be the ends of the slot.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Using a grinder, we cut out a strip of metal in the channel bridge between these two holes and knock it out with the tapering head of a hammer. This slot will set the limits of movement of the movable jaw of the vice.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Using a grinder, we cut two pieces from a suitable metal strip, the length of which is equal to the width of the corner shelf. They will serve as limiters for the movable jaw as it moves along the slot.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Next, we connect the angle and channel using a bolt and nut in the position that they will occupy in the finished vice.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

We clamp this structure in a bench vice and weld limiters to the corner transversely on both sides of the channel, holding them with pliers. To avoid accidentally welding them to the channel flanges, we place a thin piece of rubber, plastic or other dielectric material between them during welding.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Then, from a used hammer with a round head, we cut off a cylindrical blank with a grinder approximately equal in height to the diameter - the blank for the future eccentric clamp.
Quick-release eccentric vice

We mark a point at its end with some eccentricity - an indentation from the central longitudinal axis of the cylinder. Using the mark, we drill a through hole parallel to the axis of our workpiece.
Quick-release eccentric vice

From a thick strip of metal, after marking, we cut out two pieces of length and height equal to the shelf of the equal-flange angle. These are future jaw pads for quick-release vices.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

We drill two holes in these pads in the center closer to the edges. We unfold them from the front side under the heads of the mounting screws. Using a grinder, we make a notch and clean them. We test the quality of fastening the linings to the corner flanges (jaws) with two bolts and nuts.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

We weld one corner (fixed jaw) transversely to the channel web on the side opposite the slot. We reinstall the pads on the fixed and movable jaws and finally screw them in place, using a wrench and a screwdriver.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

From fairly thick metal we cut out a strip equal in size to the length of the corner, and in width to the distance between the ends of the shelves diagonally. We also weld it to ensure the strength and rigidity of the fixed jaw.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Now we take a thicker strip of metal and drill a hole at one end and cut a thread in it using a tap.Then we cut off a piece from it with a threaded hole of a rectangular shape, slightly different from a square.
This homemade rectangular nut will hold the eccentric on the movable jaw, and allow them to move along the channel web (guide) in one direction or another.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

To prevent the nut from rotating under the channel jumper, we cut off and weld two limiting guide rods on both sides of it longitudinally along the entire slot with a small gap.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

In the side of the eccentric, approximately in the middle of its height, we drill a blind hole and cut a thread in it for fastening the handle.
We assemble the movable jaw of the vice with pre-welded stops, screwing the finished cover with notches to the corner with two bolts.
Quick-release eccentric vice

We find a piece of sheet iron of sufficient thickness to ensure rigidity. We mark on it the contours of an octagonal-shaped base with two marks for holes for fastening. Using a grinder we cut it out.
We weld a channel (guide) with a fixed jaw to it. We process welds and surfaces with a grinder to remove rust, metal deposits, roughness and rounding of edges.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

We seal the sponge overlay and the longitudinal slot with a margin on the sides with construction tape.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Using an aerosol can, we paint the base, guide and fixed jaw black, the movable jaw (except for the lining) with green paint, and the eccentric with bronze.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

After the paint has dried and the tape has been removed, all parts of our eccentric vice are basically ready and just waiting for final assembly.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

To do this, we just need to install the eccentric and the movable jaw on the guide, pass the bolt through the holes and install a rectangular nut from below under the guide and screw the bolt into it.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

We screw the handle into the eccentric on the side, and secure the base of the vice with two screws to a strong wooden base. Our in-house made quick-release eccentric vices are fully ready to use.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Quick-release eccentric vice

With their help, with one movement of the eccentric handle, you can secure any workpiece in them quickly, reliably and without unnecessary effort.
Quick-release eccentric vice

Notes at the end


Since you will have to work with an angle grinder, a welding machine, or a drilling machine, you must use personal protective equipment, at least goggles to protect your eyes and gloves for your hands.
To ensure that the moving parts of the eccentric vice work without jamming, they can be lubricated from time to time with graphite grease, and the eccentric lever can be equipped with a wooden handle for convenience.

Watch the video


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Comments (5)
  1. Sergey K
    #1 Sergey K Visitors 29 November 2018 13:25
    1
    In this version, the vice simply will not work. The principle of operation of such a vice is that when you turn the handle, the bolt in the nut is AT THE SAME TIME tightened and, due to the eccentricity, the movable jaw is pressed. So the assembly for fixing the bolt head to the eccentric is missing. The video was imported, and our comrades solved the problem with the stub of a key, which was put on the head and itself, in the right place, was attached to the eccentric.
    I’m just going to do something like this, so it seems to me that this particular unit in the setup will be the most capricious - the bolt is tightened a little less and the sponge will move away, a little more and it will simply be difficult to move the sponge. And in all YouTube videos, this moment is given very condensed, if at all, but for 15-20 minutes, you have to watch how people saw, drill, sharpen, paint and at the same time boast about the presence of cool tools.

    And the second point - it seems to me that the corner, with its complex profile of the shelves, is not the best choice for a movable jaw; the pressure will occur only in the narrow part at the very bottom of the eccentric, although on the other hand this may be the calculation in this design.

    In general, a question for those who have done it, I would like to know more about setting up this unit, what pitfalls it may encounter.
  2. Grey
    #2 Grey Guests 29 November 2018 14:04
    1
    As for me, this is too narrowly a special device. If you need to process many identical parts. Otherwise, fussing with making these vices is not worth it.
    And I agree with Sergei K, they are boring with videos where they show all sorts of garbage for a long time and tediously, and snot is smeared, and the most necessary things are either not shown at all, or indistinctly, briefly.
    1. Sergey K
      #3 Sergey K Visitors 29 November 2018 16:22
      1
      No, ordinary machine vise. Well suited for drilling.
      Once upon a time I made myself these, see photo. And since then they have been living on both the drilling machine and certain jobs on the milling machine. It was done temporarily to test the technology, but it turned out that they behaved well, although the nut could not stand it and had to be changed.



      Quick-release fasteners are needed just for DIFFERENT parts, so as not to turn the screw back and forth in both directions. Especially if you work with wood, where the clamping force is not particularly needed, but the dimensions differ very much, for example, with an M8 thread, to move 200 mm you need to turn the handle 160 times! And even the skew of the jaws is not important; on the contrary, non-standard parts will be clamped better. For a drill, where most often the part is simply held by hand and only in rare cases a clamp is required, this type of vise is no longer needed!
  3. Guest Alexander
    #4 Guest Alexander Guests December 17, 2018 02:34
    0
    Why bother with such nonsense if the author has good mechanics, and he cuts the rest on the floor?
    They are included in the angle grinder stand.
  4. Basil
    #5 Basil Guests 14 April 2019 16:49
    0
    A regular nut of any shape will work perfectly in this craft.