Grizzly Remakes the Carver’s Vise
Last week I noticed that Grizzly had changed its carver’s vise.1 The castings looked different. The base looked different. And the vise’s wooden jaws were missing the urethane grippy stuff that usually comes on the jaws.
And the price was nuts: $87.99 plus free shipping. I knew we would get questions about this vise because we use it for all aspects of chairmaking. (It basically replaces the shavehorse in our shop.)
The Grizzly vise showed up today, and I put it to work. Here is my report.
Grizzly obviously remade the patterns for this vise, which is now made in China. The castings are very tidy, unlike the rough sand-cast castings on our other vises. This doesn’t affect how the vise works, but it sure looks nice.
The base of the vise is now a nice and heavy casting instead of a stamped steel shell. This is – honestly – a cosmetic upgrade for the most part. But I do really like the cast base.2 Also, the handle is now a shiny chrome thing. Again, an aesthetic upgrade.
The big change is with the jaws of the vise. Grizzly switched to an oak-looking hardwood. All the other carver’s vises I’ve used *say* they use a hardwood for the jaws. But it looks like pine and breaks like pine. And smells like pine when it breaks.
And even though the photos on Grizzly’s website show the jaws as bare wood, the jaws of the vise come lined with a rubber-like material. I have no idea what the lining is or how long it will last. But it grips just as well as the urethane.3
So basically, Grizzly has improved the looks and function of a classic vise. Yay Grizzly.
Here’s the bad news: When I went to the Grizzly site today, the vise was no longer on sale and was $150 (with free shipping). That’s about $10 cheaper than you’ll find other similar vises. So it’s still a good value – just not a steal.
If you’re not in a hurry, it might pay to haunt the Grizzly site for a while and see if they put it back on sale. I have no insider knowledge.
Am I a tool of the tool-making world? Read my full disclosure here.
Grizzly calls it the T34003 - Patternmaker's Carving Vise, but I’ve never seen a patternmaking vise like this.
Earlier forms of this vise had a cast base. Then the factory switched to a stamped one. I don’t know why.
Addition to the review: After using the vise to build a chair I noticed that the black grippy material left marks on the work, which were easily removed with a little scraping or sanding. Just FYI.
I bought this version of the vise when I bought your Roman workbench video. I want to see how that works as my primary bench. I'm opening a small shop to make hand tools ala Euclid's Door and shop furniture (workbenches and tool chests).
I got mine from Grizzly shortly before it became unavailable. This seems to answer why. Mine works perfectly; I see no need for an upgrade in my shop, but it’s nice to see it back on the market.