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Wilton Woodworking Vise -161137-10

Monte Edwards

Plastic
Joined
Sep 4, 2009
Location
Washington, DC, USA
I am building a new work bench and installing a Wilton 161137-10 wood working vise.
I bought the vise from someone who obtained several of the same model from a government workshop.
It has L shaped jaws, to clamp stock vertically or horizontally. The jaws are 7 inches by 7 inches, by 3 inches deep in both the vertical and horizontal positions. The jaws open to 9 inches. The guide bars and screw are also arranged in a L shaped pattern.
It is designed to be mounted on a 2 1/8 inch thick bench.
I weighs about 28 pounds (it was just shipped to me)
Can anyone tell me about this vise?

—Monte, Washington, DC
 

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Last edited:
What do you want to know? A picture is worth a thousand words.

The choice of a woodworking vice on a bench is a big one. It really depends on the type of work you do. I am a cabinet and furniture maker, and it took 3 bench configurations and 22 years for me to finally figure out what I want my next bench to have ( I think!). It is currently under construction, and I'll finish it, as soon as these pesky customers stop interrupting my free time with paying work. (I hope they never do.)

Wilton makes, and made, a lot of different types of vices. I have several. If you post a picture, you'll get better answers.

You can go into your original post, and edit it to post photo's.

Jeff
 
Jeff,

I am new to the forum, and I appreciate you advice about posting the photos.

I would like to know when the vise was made.

Also, the threaded casting in which the screw operates flips about 90 degrees when turning the screw in or out. Is this a quick releases mechanism?
It doesn't seem to have any such effect.

Thank you,
Monte
 
Somewhere on one of the rams of the vice there should be numbers stamped. Something like "179" or "10 45", etc.....This would be the month and year of the vice. For instance, "10 45" stands for October of 1945, and so on. The vice will be made either in Chicago or Schiller Park, if it's an older one.

My woodworking Wilton vice is different looking than yours, but the mechanism you speak of is most likely the quick release, and it may be gunked up. It's also possible that it's an anti-racking device......depends on what it looks like, as I can't tell from your photo's. Post a closeup, and we'll be able to tell you.

Oh, yeah......welcome to the forum. Great guys, and better information available here. I'm a professional woodworker learning metalwork and machining from these guys, and they are the most knowledgeable bunch around.

Here's a pic of one of my Wilton's, a bullet vice that I restored.

Wiltonvisepainted.jpg


Jeff
 
I have several (four, I think) of a similar Wilton vise that I got locally in a school auction, where (of course) a high school's shop was being dismantled and sold off. I have yet to mount any of them as I have no real woodworking bench space. The ones that I have are the more conventional arrangement with the guide rail axis locations parallel to the top edge of the vise jaws, but the rest of the construction arrangement looks very similar, as well as the paint scheme. These vises do have a quick-release screw setup, although only a couple of mine are actually complete and functional at the moment. I don't think there is anything super-special about mine, in terms of age, but I'll have to go look to see if there is a date code on them. My guess is that this type of vise might be a 1960s vintage, but Wilton may have been making them steadily off of the same patterns for the last 75 years or so...
 
I have an older version of the same vise, and would like to know how it is intended to be mounted to the bench. It has two sets of screw holes, one set on the face of the horizontal part of the vise and one set on the vertical face.

If both sets of screw holes are to be used, then the vertical jaw would end up on the inside, rather than the end of the bench, which seems more useful...

It does appear that the stop assembly can be moved to either jaw, so the vise can be installed on either end of the bench.
 








 
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