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A vise or vice (British English) is a mechanical apparatus used to secure an object to allow work to be performed on it. Vises have two parallel jaws, one fixed and the other movable, threaded in and out by a screw and lever. The jaws are often flat but may have grooves, [1] adapt to the shape of the workpiece or be custom made. [2]
A vise grip is not a vise but a pair of lever-actuated locking pliers.
The etymology of vise can be tracked via Middle English vys Anglo-French vyz from Latin vitis "vine". [3] The tight grip of the mechanical device was likened to that of the twines of the plant.
A face vise is the standard woodworking vise, always securely attached to a workbench flush with its work surface. Its jaws are made of wood or metal, the latter usually faced with wood, called cheeks, to avoid marring the work. [4] The movable jaw may include a retractable dog to hold work against a bench dog.
A "quick-release" woodworker's vise employs a split nut that allows the screw to engage or disengage with a half-turn of the handle. When disengaged the movable jaw may be moved in or out throughout its entire range of motion, vastly speeding up the process of adjustment. Common thread types are Acme and buttress.
Traditional woodworking workbench vises are commonly either face vises, attached to the front of the workbench near the left end of its long side (for a right-handed worker), or end (or tail) vises, attached to or forming part of the right side of the narrow end of the bench.
An engineer's vise, also known as a metalworking vise, machinist's vise, or, informally, a "bench vise", is used to clamp metal instead of wood. It is used to hold metal when filing or cutting. It is sometimes made of cast steel or malleable cast iron, but most are made of cast iron. The jaws are often separate and replaceable, usually engraved with serrated or diamond teeth. Soft jaw covers made of aluminum, copper, wood (for woodworking) or plastic may be used to protect delicate work. The jaw opening of an engineer's vise generally equals its jaw width, though it may be wider.
An engineer's vise is bolted onto the top surface of a workbench, [5] with the face of the fixed jaw just forward of its front edge. The vise may include other features such as a small anvil on the back of its body. Most engineer's vises have a swivel base. Some engineer's vises marketed as "homeowner grade" are made of pot metal or a very low grade of iron.[ citation needed ] Many homeowner's bench vises have an exposed screw.
A combination-vise combines an engineer-style vise with a subsidiary set of curved serrated jaws below the main for clamping pipe. A pivoting base is standard.
A clamp-on vise is a light-duty bench vise secured to a board, table, or bench by a vise-type screw on its base which rarely is able to pivot.
A vacuum-mounted vise is a small engineer's vise secured by a suction cup base and is typically used by hobbyists for very light-duty work.
Machine vises are mounted on drill presses, grinding machines and milling machines. Abrasive chop saws have a coarse-threaded or cam-actuated machine-type vise built into the saw.
A pipe vise is used by a plumber to hold pipes for threading and cutting. There are two main styles, yoke and chain. [6] The yoke uses a top-mounted screw to clamp the pipe between two fixed angled jaws at its base; the chain style secures the pipe by wrapping it within a chain designed to adjust to length by link, tightened by a cam lever.
Other kinds of vises include:
A lathe is a machine tool that rotates a workpiece about an axis of rotation to perform various operations such as cutting, sanding, knurling, drilling, deformation, facing, threading and turning, with tools that are applied to the workpiece to create an object with symmetry about that axis.
A drill is a tool used for making round holes or driving fasteners. It is fitted with a bit, either a drill or driver chuck. Hand-operated types are dramatically decreasing in popularity and cordless battery-powered ones proliferating due to increased efficiency and ease of use.
A workbench is a sturdy table at which manual work is done. They range from simple flat surfaces to very complex designs that may be considered tools in themselves. Workbenches vary in size from tiny jewellers benches to the huge benches used by staircase makers. Almost all workbenches are rectangular in shape, often using the surface, corners and edges as flat/square and dimension standards. Design is as varied as the type of work for which the benches are used but most share these attributes:
A collet is a segmented sleeve, band or collar. One of the two radial surfaces of a collet is usually tapered and the other is cylindrical. The term collet commonly refers to a type of chuck that uses collets to hold either a workpiece or a tool, but collets have other mechanical applications.
A chuck is a specialized type of clamp used to hold an object with radial symmetry, especially a cylinder. In a drill, a mill and a transmission, a chuck holds the rotating tool; in a lathe, it holds the rotating workpiece.
A drill press is a drilling machine suitable for quick and easy drilling of straight holes, countersinking or counterboring that are perpendicular to both directions of a table surface. In comparison, it is more difficult and less repeatable to drill perpendicularly with a hand-held drill.
A jackscrew, or screw jack, is a type of jack that is operated by turning a leadscrew. It is commonly used to lift moderate and heavy weights, such as vehicles; to raise and lower the horizontal stabilizers of aircraft; and as adjustable supports for heavy loads, such as the foundations of houses.
A bench dog is a removable clamp used on a woodworking workbench to hold an item fast while being worked. It is characteristically used in concert with an adjustable dog on a bench vise, allowing an item compressed between the two to be held fast on each end, and if offset in both directions.
A lathe center, often shortened to center, is a tool that has been ground to a point to accurately position a workpiece on an axis. They usually have an included angle of 60°, but in heavy machining situations an angle of 75° is used.
A bench hook is a workbench appliance used in woodworking to hold a workpiece in place while crosscutting with a hand saw. A bench hook is a simple method used to improve accuracy and safety.
A lathe faceplate is a basic workholding accessory for a wood or metal turning lathe. It is a circular metal plate which fixes to the end of the lathe spindle. The workpiece is then clamped to the faceplate, typically using t-slot nuts in slots in the faceplate, or less commonly threaded holes in the faceplate itself.
A pipe clamp is a type of clamp often employed in piping, woodworking, and cabinet shops.
A holdfast or hold fast is a form of temporary clamp used to hold a workpiece firmly to the top or side of a wooden workbench or the top of an anvil.
The screw is a mechanism that converts rotational motion to linear motion, and a torque to a linear force. It is one of the six classical simple machines. The most common form consists of a cylindrical shaft with helical grooves or ridges called threads around the outside. The screw passes through a hole in another object or medium, with threads on the inside of the hole that mesh with the screw's threads. When the shaft of the screw is rotated relative to the stationary threads, the screw moves along its axis relative to the medium surrounding it; for example rotating a wood screw forces it into wood. In screw mechanisms, either the screw shaft can rotate through a threaded hole in a stationary object, or a threaded collar such as a nut can rotate around a stationary screw shaft. Geometrically, a screw can be viewed as a narrow inclined plane wrapped around a cylinder.
In engineering, a dog is a tool or part of a tool, such as a pawl, that prevents or imparts movement through physical engagement. It may hold another object in place by blocking it, clamping it, or otherwise obstructing its movement. Or it may couple various parts together so that they move in unison – the primary example of this being a flexible drive to mate two shafts in order to transmit torque. Some devices use dog clutches to lock together two spinning components. In a manual transmission, the dog clutches, or "dogs" lock the selected gear to the shaft it rotates on. Unless the dog is engaged, the gear will simply freewheel on the shaft.
A workbench is a specialized workbench table used by woodworkers. Features include a flat, solid work surface and one or more means of holding the material being worked on.
Locking pliers are pliers that can be locked into position, using an "over-center" cam action. Locking pliers are available with many different jaw styles, such as needle-nose pliers, wrenches, clamps and various shapes to fix metal parts for welding. They also come in many sizes.
A shaving horse is a combination of vice and workbench, used for green woodworking. Typical usage of the shaving horse is to create a round profile along a square piece, such as for a chair leg or to prepare a workpiece for the pole lathe. They are used in crafts such as coopering and bowyery.
There are many types of shears used to shear or cut sheet metal.
A woodworking vise is a type of vise adapted to the various needs of woodworkers and woodworking. Several types have evolved to meet differing primary functions, falling under the general categories of front and end vises, reflecting their positions on a workbench.
