A vintage Wheel drive for the leg vise

ORIGINALY POSTED January 21, 2013

Ever since I’ve seen the wheel drive like the bench craft I thought it would be pretty cool to have, as an upgrade to my leg vice. But I’m more of a vintage guy, so something that new and shinny wouldn’t fit the decor of my shop. Plus, at over $300, I find it hard to justify.

So as I saw wheels in flea markets and antique shops I’d stop and look. Most were way more than I thought they were worth, and I even bought an old tractor steering wheel, but it just didn’t seem to fit. Then one day I ran onto this in an antique shop. The price was right, so home it came.

Heavy, vintage and cool. So lets see if it will work. I had to purchase a set of larger drill bits. I needed to enlarged the hole slightly to 15/16”. A set of bits were only about $30, so I ordered them.

So I popped the pin and removed the existing handle
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Made a new cherry knob.

And what do you know. A working vintage wheeled leg vice.

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Thanks for stopping by.