The Vice and the Jig

Those of you who have been reading me for awhile know that one of the mod's I've been wanting to do to my fiskars paper cutter was to pt an integrated jig onto it. I detailed some plans about a year ago, but last night I put it into action!

I bought
2 brass 1/4in 1.5 in round headed screws
4 brass washers to fit the screws
4 steel wing nuts (they didn't have brass and they only came in a 4 pack)

I then decided where to cut into the bed of my cutter. I figured if I went right along the rulers Id have a ready made guide. What I didn't think of or notice that this was the thickest area of plastic on the whole bed! and thus it was harder to cut than anywhere else!.

I then made 4pilot holes. I had intended to use the routing bit my dremel and route the area of travel out, his proved to be both too difficult, because of the speed of the dremel and the cheapness of the dremel routing kit. I then took my drill and drilled holes consecutively until I had a series of 30 hole next to each other for each path.

It was a lot of plastic.

I then used my wire cutters to "nip" out the remaining plastic between each hole. Again it was a l of plastic. I used my dremel to smooth out the remaining areas of plastic. After that I installed the screws, washers and nuts. I used a 1/4 inch thick piece of hardwood I had been using as a jig as the stop bloc. I drilled 2 holes for the bolts and pushed the bolts up through the wood.

I moved the stop block around to find where it would stick and stop I used a knife to shave off small amounts of plastic until it moved smoothly. Now I can slide the wood to where I need it to be, lock it down with the nuts, and cut away, and there is NO WAY this baby is moving ANYWHERE!

I will post pics later.

The Vice should be an entry all on it own, BUT here goes. My work bench came with a huge charming antique vice. I'm in love with it, it's heavy, patina'd with age and use, and did I mention it's awesome!?! I knew that it was of no real use to me in it's normal postion, gravity would make everything slide out of it. So I positioned it on the front of the bench so that the grip works up and down, LIKE A BOOK PRESS!!! The jaw is deep for a vice but not really deep enough for a press, but it is perfect for my hedgehogs! I plan on making some over sized wooden jaws that will make it more useful to me as a press.

Again pictures a little later today.