Arcady wrote:

I am looking for 4" cross slide vise and HF has two of those - regular one:
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...Itemnumber=538
and one with "prismatic jaws":
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...Itemnumber=106
could you please explain me the difference? I saw the first one on
display (and unfortunately it's out of stock - so I have to buy online)
but not the second.


My guess is that the second is the same as the first with the addition of an
extra vise jaw which most likely looks a lot like this one:
http://www.grizzly.com/products/G1065/images

I have "been there done that" with cross-slide vises. Quite some time ago I
bought a 4" cross-slide vise from Grizzly (also picked up the above-pictured
jaw) and also picked up a vise adapter which I used to mount the CS vise on my
Jet 17" drill press. I did a lot of good work with that setup. Later I was
visiting the (now closed) J&L store in Kent, Washington and saw an inexpensive
5" CS vise. Feeling flush, I bought it. Sadly, I soon realized that the
inexpensive version of this vise are quite devoid of useful properties, and had
to let that one go.

My suggestion is to buy this item from either me (I kept it when I sold my Jet
DP) or to buy it new from Grizzly, and to pass entirely and for all time on the
HF version, which is at least as cheap as the J&L one I mentioned above. Low
quality on these vises leads to surfaces out of parallel or out of
perpendicularity, lead screws which bind or fail to hold, gib screw holes which
are excessively drilled before tapping, screw handles which are excessively out
of balance and which move easily with any vibration, and general poor fit and
finish.

In use, I suggest you replace the gib screws with thumbscrews, as you will be
clamping them down all the time to lock the vise from moving.

To contact me offline, please visit http://www.tinyisland.com/email.html as my
Usenet 'reply-to' address is bogus in every respect and you can not infer my
actual email address from it.

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington