vise jaw material

Is there any reason not to use softwood jaws for a bench vise?

Mark,
I use poplar for mine. Not as soft as pine, spruce, or aspen, but still pretty soft. Mine are half an inch thick, and I've imbedded two neodymium magnets in each so that they stay in place during use, but can be easily removed if necessary.

I used to have one set that was faced with cork, but the cork got torn up fairly quickly, and I just never bothered replacing it.
 
I used beech which is not expensive around here. It's pretty hard but not so hard as to damage things. My vises primarily hold dogs to tighten against dogs in the bench so I needed a material hard enough to hold the dog without wearing out. If you're clamping items between the jaws, other than the wear-factor I see no problems.
 
I pad my vice Jaws with copper. It works like steel, lasts like steel and is as soft as wood. Works good for me.
 
Isn't 24K gold cheaper and softer than copper now? Good for those gilded age pieces. :rofl:

My original question was me thinking of replacing my current oak jaws to mount dogs (old jaws were only 3/4" thick, dogs need 3/4" hole). What I did was to add a piece of 2 by 4 offcut to the back of the rear jaw. I should be able to get pics tonight.

It seems like all of my self made shop improvement bits are offcuts from Ned's shop construction lately.... :huh: :dunno: :thumb:
 
:D

Seen the price of copper lately :doh:

I use whatever hard wood I have around that is the right size etc.

Cheers!

Copper has somehow got this reputation for being overly expensive, but the cost is dropping. I have bought a lot of copper lately, a few hundred feet of copper tubing for my propane heating system, and a few sheets for my cupola. At work we use it all the time and it runs about 60 bucks for a 3 foot by 8 foot sheet, 20 gauge.

This cupola cost about 100 bucks...

Besides, if you see a plumber or a tin knockers shop, they would give you the scraps you need to make some copper jaws. Not arguing with anyone here mind you, just saying copper can be had and it works good.

Cupola_From_South2.JPG
 
And I was just pulling your leg Travis.

Copper or Aluminum do make good jaw faces, and are fairly forgiving for sure, I like them on my metalworking vices, but for a woodworking vice, I'd rather have.............wood :wave:
 
In the past I have used leather on the inside faces of the vice and liked it really well, but heck, around here these days, it is about double the price of copper.:eek:
 
And I was just pulling your leg Travis.

Copper or Aluminum do make good jaw faces, and are fairly forgiving for sure, I like them on my metalworking vices, but for a woodworking vice, I'd rather have.............wood :wave:

To be honest with you Stu, I could not tell if you were serious or not. Probably a bad on my end. If I came off as being upset at you I certainly wasn't. If I came off as being disgruntled on my end, I certainly did not mean to be.

Trust me, when you lose a wife to some internet slob, have a sister get killed in a car accident, have your parents house burn down...well there is NOTHING you could possibly say regarding vice jaw materials that could upset me!:rofl:
 
Copper has somehow got this reputation for being overly expensive, but the cost is dropping.

It got that reputation by tripling in price over the last 10 years, most of the increase being in the last two. So while always expensive relative to other readily available metals, its definitely seen and upswing recently - that's for new material of course, offcuts from a shop could be a different story.

Last copper mine I worked for (and the only one), they used to say that a mine that could break even on $0.75 copper was a good mine (price at the time was around $1.25/lb). Price is currently somewhere up around $3.50/lb.
 
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