Leg Vise (of sorts)

While The Fuzz makes no claims as to his joinery, he does find himself involved in various projects at times.  And many of these involve wood working.  He has learned through experience that having the piece in question firmly secured goes a long way toward making the job more successful and enjoyable.

And so the other day he decided to add a leg vise to his workbench.

In researching this project, he discovered that one aspect of a real leg vise is a way to keep the jaws alined vertically parallel to each other.

It seems that there are a number of ways to achieve this.

Here we see a couple of ways this can be done.

On the left there are a multitude of holes with a pin to adjust for the thickness of the work piece.

On the right we see a set of 2 screws linked by a chain and sprocket system to keep thing lined up.

But in his research, The Fuzz had happened upon a post where a guy had used an alternate, much less complex method to achieve this.
It seems that in his research this guy misread another post, and developed an alternative system of his own.
(The fact that he had been drinking a bit of beer could have contributed to this!)
Anyway, rather than using a complicated arrangement, he simply used a spacer at the foot (3), corresponding to the size of the work piece.  He further refined this by utilizing a tapered spacer - thus making the whole thing adjustable as well!
Great idea, and definitely compatible with The Fuzz's style.

Naturally, The Fuzz had his own way of doing things.
Because of the offset of the leg (1)...

He thought it best to mount the "jaw" at a corresponding angle.

This block (2) is only temporary for test purposes and will be replaced with some tapered pieces later.
He hit the Home Improvement Store for some threaded rod, nuts and a couple of pieces of pipe.

Holes were then drilled through the "vise" and a corresponding spot on the leg of the workbench - being careful to keep everything lined up and level. 

The pipes were threaded into these holes...

And a nut welded to the one in the leg.

The Fuzz had driven a piece of a hex shaped socket* on the other end of the threaded rod foolishly thinking it would hold...

Of course it didn't once it was screwed down and pressure applied.

So he ended up welding that one as well.

He finished up by carving out a hardwood handle to fit over the hex shaped end.

If this thing seems to be just a little bit tilted, that's because it is.

But this was intentional in order to allow for a slightly wider jaw.  This slight angle shouldn't have any affect on the griping power of the thing.

*This was like one of those old sparkplug wrenches...

Kinda  like this one.

 

Still Livin'

Just a quick post here to show that The Fuzz is still living.

1st

We would like to report that The Fuzz and His sweetie did make it back home to the woods safe and sound.

They did have quite an adventure, being gone about 3 weeks this time.

 Maybe The Fuzz will have more to say about that later.

But for now... no.

But he has been busy since their return.

There was a bit of yard work to catch up on.

And He finally got around to working on the "bricks".

Going back...

Way back...

To the start of the Pond Project.

A close look will show that there were more than rocks involved in this delivery.

The Bricks were to be used for the Fuzz's shop,

in the "carport" area where he parks his bike, and works on larger projects.

This kept being put off for various reasons-

some not all that good.

But now it was time to get it done.

New steps!
Of course it is not exactly finished.
The Fuzz needs to add a bit of mortar to the bricks on the edges, and sweep a bit of sand into the gaps between the bricks.

But it is a big improvement.

Art on the Wall

The Fuzz and His Sweetie have collected a bit of art over the years.  No Van Goghs or anything like that of course.  But there are not a lot of places to display all these treasures out here in the woods in the trailer.  One solution is to swap off every now and again.  But even this requires a place to swap off to.

So His Sweetie recently requested that The Fuzz put up one of those little shelves where one could set a piece, and easily change it when desired.

So, taking a mental inventory of his small wood stash, The Fuzz headed out to the shop.

Earlier in the woodcutting season, The Fuzz had experimented with cutting some small boards out of a piece of cherry firewood.  They had been just laying around the shop (like so many other things).  But this looked like the time to put them to use.

Here's a look at the finished product.

Why only 2 off center mounting screws?

That was the only wall stud in the area.

But it should be plenty strong enough to hold a painting...

Like this one.

Power Tools

It is sort of a long term project, But The Fuzz is still working on getting his shop together.

One of the things on his wish list was a Drill Press.

Not having a lot of room in there, or a lot of money to spend, he had decided to go with a bench top model.

Having come onto a bit of cash, Our Fuzz decided now was as good of time as any.

So after checking around a bit on line, he headed over to the brand new Harbor Freight Store.

I guy could spend a lot of time in there, just looking and lusting after guy stuff.

Well, here's what he came home with.

Step 1 was to unpack it all.

Actually it was not all that difficult for The Experienced Fuzz to assemble this brand new piece of equipment.

There was a bit of a complication in mounting the thing.

Amazingly enough, in his whole collection of bits of everything, there were not any bolts suitable for mounting it to the small work bench.

But he was able to improvise something for the time being.

He will have to do this properly in the future.

But for now, here it is!