I just finished up cleaning & repaint to an old bench vise from an auction.

At first I thought I would give the main screw (and the swivel base lock bolt) a light coat of axle grease.  Then I thought that might not be the best thing in a dusty shop.  What do y'all suggest for this application?

Parafin wax.

CRC Power Lube?

Johnson's Paste Wax

I've used the paraffin and the Jonson's paste wax, they both work well. The Johnson's has been discontinued (apparently), at least the original formula. I was able to find the last can at my local hardware and picked it up. There are a number of other wax products that will work just as well.

Go ahead and grease it. Big industry is not using wax. None of those desirable Old Iron woodworking machines ever saw  any wax.  It was grease all the way.  

There  is way too much prancing around the issue of dust.  there will always be dust  and  Super high density mineral oi (paraffin wax) Can Only lubricate when it is actually in between surfaces and in mechanically stressed surfaces it is excluded pretty quickly.  So there is almost never any wax  at the points of contact, and it's a lousy lubricant anyway.

Lubricating oils, on the other hand, have high pressure stabilizers and lubricant enhancing compounds like molybdenum  sulfur  and other additives that  keep the lube in place at those metal to metal contact points.

So what about that dust that so many worry over?

Fhugetabout it~!!  The silica in dust is not going to be any where near as destructive as metal-to-metal galling and spalling

 

Some time ago I caught that wax fad, I  thought I should be concerned about it (because all the cool  kids were) and fell for the "Wax only" thing.  then when I took a magnifying glass to the metal surfaces I realized I was  not being smart.  Mineral oil is a crappy lube any way.  So I switched to Dow Corning 321 Black Molybdenum dry lubricant spray.   It seemed OK.

But eventually  I got sick of the horrid mess the stuff makes and the fact that it offers no protection against moisture and rust. 

 

So I switched to plain old grease on  the trunnion of my Austrian Sliding table saw and stressed parts of my Jointer/Planer.

Once in a while I wipe the old grease off with it's compliment of dust and apply new.

For the bearings on the sliding table  I use straight 30 weight engine oil (or whatever oil I have to hand).  I wipe off the old and wipe on the new.

 

There ARE lubricating Waxes and Wax emulsions.  They are not paste wax.  They are engineered  lubricants.

 

As an aside: I use Auto-Transmission oil on my oil-stones because while being an oil it is also highly detergent and clears the stone of anything that might want to clog up the grit.

Edited May 23, 20223 yr by Cliff

11 minutes ago, Cliff said:

I use Auto-Transmission oil on my oil-stones because while being an oil it is also highly detergent and clears the stone of anything that might want to clog up the grit.

Thanks for the tip!

4 hours ago, Cal said:

I just finished up cleaning & repaint to an old bench vise from an auction.

At first I thought I would give the main screw (and the swivel base lock bolt) a light coat of axle grease.  Then I thought that might not be the best thing in a dusty shop.  What do y'all suggest for this application?

I don't see any pictures.

 

I keep an aerosol can of " lithium white grease" on hand for applications like this. Stays put, easy to clean and reapply when needed.

 

Teflon spray.  Stays dry, does not attract dust and grit.  Use it on my vises and table saw.

 

Thanks for all the suggestions.  I started with some spray lithium white grease on the swivel mount.  When I wiped off the overspray there was red paint on the rag   Luckily there wasn't much, but it didn't use any more.

For the main screw I used whatever grease was in my grease gun - for all those reasons Cliff mentioned...

 

@kmealy - I have and do use the teflon dry lube on my table saw also, and also the various tool box slides I've cleaned up.  I'm not real sure I like it though.  On my ts, I clean up with automotive brake cleaner, spray the lube on and I can raise/lower/tilt the blade with one finger.  Within a couple days I am back to really struggling to do those adjustments...

 

19 hours ago, Grandpadave52 said:

I don't see any pictures.

 

Here you go Dave.

 

 

4 hours ago, Cal said:

Here you go Dave.

 

4 hours ago, Cal said:

Thanks for all the suggestions.  I started with some spray lithium white grease on the swivel mount.  When I wiped off the overspray there was red paint on the rag   Luckily there wasn't much, but it didn't use any more.

Best guess, the new paint wasn't fully cured/hardened. Used it for years on automotive door hinges/pins, slides, hood latches, hinges with no ill effects. YMMV.

I wished I had not bragged about Johnson's paste wax so much for the last time I bought a can it was around 3.95 a can. I started using it when I went to work at the furniture store in 1954 for that is all we ever used but I just now looked at Walmart to see if they still sold it and yes but 

but I think it has jumped up over my price range at todays prices.

I got the last can at our local hardware last week and paid $8.95...which I though was pretty high since, like you, my last can was $4. I suspect that's a 3rd market seller at Walmart, heck I'd sell the can I just bought for $58 if I thought someone was stupid enough to pay that.

3 hours ago, Fred W. Hargis Jr said:

heck I'd sell the can I just bought for $58 if I thought someone was stupid enough to pay that

That is a steal. Marked down from $71.46. I still have a new, un-opended can I bought in 2020. It should bring even more since it's "vintage." 

 

Edit Add: just looked on flea bay. Available for $32.95 which includes free shipping. Much better buy when you factor gas. 

Edited May 24, 20223 yr by Grandpadave52

18 hours ago, Grandpadave52 said:

Best guess, the new paint wasn't fully cured/hardened. Used it for years on automotive door hinges/pins, slides, hood latches, hinges with no ill effects. YMMV.

 

I am pretty sure that was the case.  I've also used the spray lithium for years without issue, the paint was Rustoleum hammered - and I know that stuff is tough as nails also.  We'll chalk this one up to operator error...

Ya grease is fine for a bench vise, but if it was for a "woodworkers vise" grease would never be used Until I saw your image of the steel vise, I thought we were talking a woodworker's vise and I bout fell over to the suggestion of grease, but the image cleared it all up for me.

On 5/23/2022 at 1:13 PM, kmealy said:

Teflon spray

Just in time for the lecture on environmental stewardship?