Adjustable Slip-On Threading Tapping Vise Pads (Upright Rods)

thingiverse

These are slip-on vise pads that adjust easily in OpenSCAD for secure grip on screws, bolts, or rods without jaw marks on the work-piece. These pads fit snugly around the entire jaw of your bench vise, preventing them from falling off during use. To adjust these pads to match your bench vise's jaw dimensions, modify the parameters viseX, viseY, and viseZ (refer to diagrams above). Increase measurements by 1% to account for ABS shrinkage. See tips below to minimize warping. The thickness of the top, bottom, sides, and face are adjustable in millimeters. Print Settings Printer: i3 clone, made in China Rafts: No Supports: Yes Notes: A raft is not required; I suggest a 10mm brim to minimize warping on the face (print face-down). Keep the clamp pressed on the "face" of the grain and not on the edges to prevent cracking. Maintain a hot temperature since warping will be a problem. In the OpenSCAD script, set "overhang" to zero to prevent severe warping. If you minimize viseZ, there will be little or no warping at all (pictured above). These pads are strong under compression; if you use high pressure on your vise, print at 30% infill, 1.6mm walls, and 1.6mm top/bottom thickness. In the script, increase vise dimensions by a percentage to account for shrinkage. I recommend adding 1% to jaw dimensions when printing with ABS. Using 1%, I can slip these pads on and off by hand without any slop. Using OpenSCAD, change the size of the rod you can hold by changing the value of rRad to the radius of the rod (defaulted to 10mm). Manually adjust the position along viseX dimension using the value rOffset. For the first face, use rod(rRad=,rOffset=); when printing the reverse face, use reverseRod(rRad=,rOffset=) to mirror the rod positions automatically. This only matters if "overhang" is nonzero. Post-Printing Removing Supports: Use a knife and pliers; only use a file with good filtration. Clean enough! Preventing Warping: Set overhang to zero for minimal warping. Pretty Flat Bad Examples of Warping: Overhang causes warping in the rest of the piece. Badly Warped Overhang Difference: Minimize viseZ value and make it uniform around the entire piece to minimize warping. Left-to-Right: Flat (no overhang), Warped, Flat (no overhang), Warped Threading: I have threaded screws, bolts, and rods without these pads; it takes a lot of pressure to mar the clamped area. With these pads, you don't need to squeeze so hard. Testing the pads by adding a few threads (M5-0.8 screw). Proof: I added about 1cm of turns to one of the screws; this shows that these pads work fine. How I Designed This OpenSCAD I designed this using OpenSCAD. Using the script, you can put your desired rod size in your desired position just by changing a few numbers and pressing "F6." I hope this comes in handy.