When this build is up and running, it is a proper blacksmithing station: the finished vise clamps a glowing steel bar in its clean, polished jaws, and the last sequence shows heating and hammer-forming work right there in the jaws. For a tool picked up secondhand for 40 dollars, the transformation is satisfying to follow from rusty heap to working rig.
The maker started with a rough example: a bent leg, a broken hinge section, seized mounting hardware, and a greasy acme screw. The damaged leg was cut off before the crack rather than restored, and the bent section was heated with an oxy-acetylene torch and pulled straight with a heavy cheater pipe. Reassembly brought in a pivot pin, wedge keys, a flat leaf spring, and the threaded screw mechanism. The stand is a thick square timber beam cut to length on a miter saw, notched with a circular saw and hand chisels, then sanded and stained. Custom steel collars cut from sheet plate cap the beam and were arc-welded to a steel floor base, with the vise lag-bolted to the post.
Small touches stand out: relief notches cut with an angle grinder, brackets heated and hammered to shape over an anvil, hardware cleaned on a belt sander, die grinder, portable bandsaw and bench buffer, and the body masked with blue painter's tape before the black went on. The marking on the vise reads MSS 3529, a nice bit of character kept visible.
One open trade-off is the finish. A budget sandblaster stripped the rust, but left a texture that rusted fast in the local air, so paint was applied over it to fill the texture and save time. The maker admits the coating choice was rushed and wishes more research had gone into it.