"I don´t want to make a huge project out of this..." he says, having already thrown parts on the lathe and surface grinder. That is why we love you Stefan, lol.

I can't be the only one who wants to see what stefan would do if he DID want to make it into a science project?

“I dont want to make a huge project out of this” proceeds to grind matched parallels on six sides for a bench vise 😅😂

“I’m trying not to make a science fair project out of this one” 😂 I know that feeling. Great modifications!

Robin Ronzetti said it best: "Everything is a kit." Great job! I loved your tip on measuring in from an edge with calipers. Thanks for sharing.

"you're usually at a point where stuff is going really really wrong if you need to do that" I knew this video was gonna make my day. I just didn't know it was gonna make it THAT GOOD 😂🤣

Fun video Stefan. Being a cheep fellow I've bought quite a few import tools and mostly found that, with some work, decent stuff can be made out of them. As many others have said: "Your not buying a tool, your buying a kit." Also, as you have shown so well here, they are cheep enough to modify for special uses, our creativity being the limiting factor.

'well beating on stuff with a hammer is often a very good solution' LOL you made my day sir.

About the screw plate... I think it would be fine, rifle stocks are held together with this sort of metal-wood-metal bolted sandwich, often with only 2 M6 bolts. If you're worried about long term crush, perhaps you could take a page from them? Pillar bedding is a technique where metal (usually aluminum) sleeves are placed over the bolts, cut to length just slightly shorter than the wood thickness, allowing the screws to be torqued down while limiting the amount of force the wood sees.

Always enjoy a video starting with "I got one of these import........" 🙂

That trick of using the top edge of callipers as a marking gauge is so helpful. Thanks for pointing it out.

That has to be one of your most DYNAMIC, and gripping videos to date. 😉😉😁

A very welcome return Stefan. Looking forward to what you do with this.

The "little" things you do in a fully stocked machine shop when something annoys you. lol.

When I got my first home mill, I didn't have money to buy a good vise. I purchased a very crappy import one and just made do until I found a used Kurt. Years later I found that old one and decided to accurize it. Did many of the same things you did and now I have a decent, light-duty, mill vise. Mainly use it for quick one-off parts and don't want to break a setup on my main vises. Enjoyed the video!

Sort of refreshing to hear you essentially say "good 'nuff." I like seeing where you think its critical and where it really doesn't matter.

This comment is unrelated to this specific video, but I recently bought a 9x20 import lathe, moving up from my old 3x8 Sherline... and by sheer coincidence it seems to be more or less the same as your old 9x20 way back when. I just want you to know that your videos, even almost a decade old, are still helping hobbyist/home shop machinists out there :D. Now a solid toolpost is a given for me, but do I want to do the tailstock quill mod or do carriage drilling? Decisions, decisions...

Great little project Stefan. One thing I would advise, if the bench does start to crush and looking at the quality of it that may well be the outcome over time. The solution is to get yourself some 19mm Baltic Birch plywood . That stuff is as hard as nails, and 4 eight millimetre screws will never crush birch plywood. It's probably easier to obtain in Germany than it is in the UK, where it has almost totally disappeared . All we get now is Far Eastern ply which is rubbish. By the way I'm now a hobby machinist but in another life I was a high school teacher of woodwork and metal work and before that I was a church pipe organ builder, and thus have used many sheets of Baltic Birch Plywood. It's the very best stuff!

Cheap Chinese tooling is usually written-off as either “works okay for the money” or “straight in the bin”. It’s really cool to see you make these modifications. It helps me understand the strengths and weaknesses of these products. Really useful (and of course entertaining). Thank you!

I have a similar vice but quick a bit smaller.. It's great for the price. Very nice project Stefan, thanks for taking us along !

Great work as always...and I love the fact that your cardboard CNC enclosure is still going strong!!! 🙂

Very interesting modification Stefan.Thank you for your time.

It's not a travelling nut - it's a DYNAMIC nut. Ha. Thanks again for another excellent video. I hope your mood improves. All the best.

I almost goes for this kind of vise but decide to get regular Bison bench vise instead for my first vise in the shop years ago. Thank you for showing that it can be improved (with enough skill and dedication of course).

Love your videos with manual work. Thanks man.

Very happy to see a new video from you 🙂. For what it is, that’s not a terrible vice, which has now been turned into a useful asset for the shop. 👍🇳🇱

Quite the glow-up, imagine this vice going to its 10 year reunion.

I have the same Heuer vice! Thanks, Stefan, for praising it.

those jaws are better aligned than my life.

Very cool project Stefan! It looks like it perfectly suits your needs.

Perfect, as always, cheers from Bulgaria

Thank you Stefan! I would have never thought of most of that.

Very nice! A fun little project that saves money and offers real benefits at the same time.

I love when you completely redo a Chinese “kit” tool. I absolutely do it all the time now after watching you. When I buy something I consider how to tear it apart and make it better. In fact, I’ll buy a tool so that I can redo it. Taking on a project to expand my shops capabilities when I have the time to do so

Great video as always Stefan 👍👍

0:17 Great build Stefan! I love modified tool builds,and with your precision and thought of space utilization was a fun watch.also the Kopal clamp cameo I covet, haha!hope you do more shop tool builds.

A nicely upcycled vice. It looks like it might have been malleable iron given the chip formation.

Nice upgrades. Well done.

Hi Stefan, this may have been your best video to date, most enjoyable, as you were the true Stefan Gotteswinter!

As always the import hobby kit assemblies are a joy to watch!

Great project and result. 😊👍

That was a fun way to spend the morning with my coffee. Thanks!

ahhhh, after hours of scraping Practice...a GTWR Video :)

Very interesting. Nice work sir

I love seeing these kind of projects. My brain needs a break every once in a while from your NASA level work.

Love your Videos, watched every single one of them, I did my Apprenticeship from Siemens Training Center India.

Thank you Stefan!

Excellent, as always!!! Thank you!

“Every vise needs a place to live…” - Stefan going all Bob Ross.

Gut gemacht 🙌

I put a thrust bearing on the tightening screw. Much smoother to use and easy to tighten and loosen. I got my vice from princess auto in Canada, paid under a 100 for it. Same design but better finish and paint.

The proverbial sow's ear becomes silk purse. Actually the vise wasn't all that bad to begin with. But, your modifications certainly make it a far more valuable tool. Thanks for another excellent video.

@ 31:00 I like the way you turned the level around. A+

It's not too shabby 👍

Nice one. Cheers. Enjoyed watching.

That brontosaurus helicopter clamp on the drill press is pretty cool

Very impressive

good video stefan,,thanks for your time

The Traveling Vice Nuts, great band from the 70s

10:40 if you have some tubing, you can replace that part with a reaching nut. Essentially, the moving jaw's riding surface becomes fully encapsulated and the nut is moved from the back of the vise all the way to the front at the static jaw. Popular mod these days as it puts the nut against the casting and thus makes it stronger.

I've had one of these for about 10 years. They were sold in the US under the Bessey name at Home Depot. I agree that the biggest issue is the horrible finish on the jaws. Ruins anything you clamp with the slightest bit of pressure. I leave a set of rubber jaw covers on 99% of the time. Overall, it's been worth the $50 I spent when it was on closeout.

Well done 👍

There's hope for you yet! That's almost down to us mortals standards, almost. 😜 Looks like you can make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. I love watching your work.

Now that's a good idea! Even the drill press sounds good .will jave to look for those table clamps now !! Great stuff as usual

I have to agree with the others. There is something very amusing about watching a precision machinist bring a vice into acceptability as he finds ever more flaws. We love you. 😅

Wow! Caliper tricks, setup block tricks. What a great video.

Nice job Stefan, as usual so that should go without saying. When I get an import item, especially if it has castings, I just automatically consider it to be a project kit. Some need only small things like tossing all the fasteners and replacing them with better than minimum grade hardware. I never have had access to a surface grinder so can't give things that treatment. I've scraped a few surfaces that just did not fit. Even with my minimal facilities and talent I can have a fairly decent tool for a affordable price, most times, I can't match Stefan's results but better than when it came in the door is better than nothing. Just getting the burrs off the edges is a giant step forward. Flush out all the crap and chips they exported helps greatly too.

Enjoyed! Thanks!

The step measuring feature was a Mitutoyo innovation at least forty years ago. "Quadri-measure" was an exclusive selling point. Now virtually all calipers have it.

Thanks Stefan - excellent as usual. I could say a lot, but I'll comment on only one thing: I'm glad you mentioned that scribing with calipers is bad for the calipers - it drives me mad when I see people doing it!

Hello Stefan, I’m with you - those low-cost vises need some tuning up just to be bearable. 👍

Nice science project

Simple and effective🎉

Four fairly large diameter, steel bushings counter bored into the wood top with the steel plate below would be a good option. That way when you tighten down the vise, it’s gonna land on the bushings . Would likely still leave an imprint in the top but at least it would be rigid and easily removable on and off.

Enjoyed seeing your approach to a lower-precision, "just make it work" kind of project - I tend to lean towards being too perfectionist when machining, and end up not getting much done (hobbyist, so no time pressure either), so it's always interesting to see what corners people cut and why, especially from someone who normally lives on the precision side of things :) (Side note: at 21:30 I was doubting if you'd really skip cleaning up the ends, after already bringing out the grinding vise... and whaddaya know, next shot they're back on the grinder in spite of the narration :P)

Enjoyed 😊

I see a future for you in buying / detailing / resale cheap and cheerful vices. 😅😅😅 P S enjoyed our time with you.

I have a very nice version of this sort of vice, by Swindens, a English company. One of the less obvious things you can do with it is hold a pipe or bar in the pipe holding jaws (the cast iron ones, in your case) and then ROTATE THE VICE 90 degrees on the axis of the screw. As long as your bench is high enough, you can now work on the END of the securely held bar/pipe rather easily.

Don't worry about the wood crush; the vise itself has more "unit pressure" than the backing plate, and with that large area, you'll not suffer any consequences. Your "quick and dirty" projects are more _sciency_ than the precision projects of many of us.

I saw a youtube commenter once that was convinced the step function on the calipers was just coincidence and not intentional 😂

Watching a dude with your skill and mindset moving fast is fun. Not a 70 euro vise any more!

Nice!

Hey Stefan! Thanks for this video! You could put some cylindrical bushings between the steel plate and the base. Hight should be as the thickness of the wooden top or slightly less. It seems that you are very happy with the cardboard enclosure of the CNC mill :D Greetings from Nürnberg Alex

Stefan's not precise work is better than my precise work!

Stefan what is your favorite coffee. You will always go that extra step and that is what makes you top of line machinist. Its something i try to do in my hobby machine shop.

Nice! Gotteswinter came down to my level for once 😃 This was a fun video. Thanks.

Hi Stefan, Possible workaround for mounting the vise. Inset a plate into the bench, securing the two plates to each other with clearance holes for M8 on the top plate and thread the lower plate. You could perhaps utilise the setup for attaching any other tool/ fixture deemed suitable.

Ohhh been a while since weve seen mods to a chinese tool! Looking forward to it!!

StefanWerk Schraubstock nice.

Stefan, add 4 drill bushings thick wall, into the wood table, all drill bushings same height and inside diameter to the bolts being clamping. The vise and lower plate will clamp on the drill bushings not the wood, just an idea.

Excellent work Stefan thank you. I am impressed with your drill press, speeds and threading capabilities, what brand / model is it please.

Parallelish is a good example of some useful word abuse, consider also "parallel adjacent" when variety is wanted. 😜 Overall this project is a good upgrade while showing excellence in simulated self control while never losing that dash of over the top,

"trying not to make a science fair project..." The struggle is real brother, best of luck! ✌ 🇦🇺

You might consider replacing the steel jaws with copper, I did that to a vise and simply love it.

As has been pointed out in this space more than once, Import tooling is really just a pre-assembled kit.

50:40 thx SG

I started calling it a dynamic jaw in the late 70’s

👍😎

That Vice looks good .....coffee in cup not so much

Sehr schön Stefan, hab auch so einen im Gartenhaus und betrachte ihn nun mit ganz anderen Augen :) Und was ist mit painting ?!?