Blood, Sweat, and Sawdust

The past weeks have been hectic, but I was finally able to get the Bench Crafted classic leg vise installed.  The installation was a little daunting, but careful layout ensured a good fit.

I started laying out the criss-cross mortises by marking where I wanted the bottom of the chop on the leg.  From there, I was able to mark out the mortise and vise screw locations.  Then, I carefully transferred my lines to the chop.  I roughed out the mortises on the drill press.  I cleaned them up with a plunge router and chisel.

With the mortises complete, I fit the retro brackets and marked the machine screw holes.  I bored out pilot holes on the drill press, and then tapped them with a 5/16-inch bottoming tap.  Everything came together nicely.

Next, I bored a counter-bore in the leg for the acetal bushing.  I finished boring the holes for the vise screw and gave everything a test fit.  Then, it was only a matter of attaching the rest of the hardware.

If I had to do it over again, I would have used a larger router bit to clean up the criss-cross mortises.  Cleaning up the bottom of the mortises in six or seven passes was time-consuming.  I still have to shape the chop, but that will be the easy part.

Next up, draw boring.  Stay tuned.

You can find links to my other Roubo posts here:  Project Index