WEN Cross Vise, 3.25-Inch with Compound Slide for Mills and Drill Presses

I got my Wen 4.25 cross slide vise this morning. I don’t know how Amazon can deliver it overnight for free? Box was in perfect condition and I knew I was off to a good start. I unboxed it and started playing with it. It comes with the slides locked and handles off. I assembled it and adjusted it and I was pretty excited about how nice it looked and functioned. I disassembled it and cleaned it up and used valve lapping compound on all the contact surfaces. Lubed it up and reassembled. It works really great for an 80.00 vise. I read reviews about the quality and I think it’s great for the price. You can probably get a 700.00 to 1,000 dollar vise that is near perfect. Everyone would still buy this vise because they don’t want to spend the money on a high quality piece, myself included. I did buy 4 new set screws and nuts to replace the set screws that doesn’t have nuts. It made a big difference because I had screws back off when I was playing with it. I have yet to mount it or clamp anything in it but I don’t see any problems with it. The casting was smooth and looks good also. I wanted a Wilton 5” for my JET IDP22 but I couldn’t get any Dimensions on the base to see if it would work with my table slot locations. It looks small on my drill press… if you are willing to spend some time on it, you will have a good tool…

If you read the reviews about these cheap vises, you will see a lot of complaints about how smooth they are, or that they can't get tight enough to not wobble. The angles measure 30 degrees (or 120 depending on your perspective), so I cut a small piece of pine 1x3 at 30 degrees, wrapped it with sandpaper, and got to work on the tracks. I used 220 - 400 - 600 grit, as I already had it from other projects. I decided it was better to keep the sanding even, and leave the deeper tooling marks visible, but smoothed out, than to have perfect looking tracks that are uneven. I spent about 4 hours cleaning, sanding, chasing the threads, lubing with a thick oil, and adjusting. In all the reviews I read no one mentioned the angle or making a tool to fit the groove (a wooden block). I now have a cross vise that should be worthy of milling out a few 7mm tracks (mlok) in a piece of wood, but also exceptional for just dialing in a location to drill. It still has play when direction of the dial is changed, and I suppose a nylon washer or thrust bearing would help, but for my purposes is it great. It is smooth on both x and y axis, and when I stop anywhere along the track, it is rock solid. Make sure to sand the plates, especially where the notch is stamped into them, and lube the handles too. 3/8" bolts fit, 1/2" is too wide, I used 1-1/2" length on my craftsman 12", but also bought 2" and large and small washers and wing nuts so as to not drive back to the big orange box for bolts. Btw, I first purchased the HFS 4" cross vise, which I had to send back because the set screw was stuck (and was a flat head). Although I wanted that vise because it sat lower on the press, the quality was terrible, with cheap handles, and terrible casting voids, so I ordered this one, hoping that if the design was good enough for wilton or palmgren, it might come from the same place, and be ok with some work. Time will tell, but right now I am happy.

Exactly as stated by several people who bought it. I spent a few hours after disassembling it (watching carefully, for reassembly). I cleaned off all the factory oil film. I polished all the friction areas using 600 grit sandpaper. This removed some small roughness and burrs. After thoroughly cleaning the threads of the worm screws (Longitudinal Feed, Cross Feed and Leadscrew) I observed if there were any imperfections. I don't know if I was lucky, the CV413 unit I received came with very well-defined threads. After all the above process, I lubricated the rails, bearings, worm screws, and even the handles, all with a layer of WD-40 Specialist White Lithium Grease Spray. I reassembled the vise, readjusted the screws that define the longitudinal and transverse displacement pressure and the result was excellent and surprising, showing that the WEN is a good quality tool, needing only a little rework after leaving the box. Smooth movements without play, except in the crank handles when reversing the direction of movement. Yes, that was the only downside... It is a small deficiency mentioned by others, however, it does not compromise the tool in my humble opinion. Anyway, great cost-benefit! With this procedure, I would recommend its purchase without any hesitation.

I bought this vise to mount to my benchtop drill press so that I could do some milling in addition to drilling. I had not previously purchased any Wen brand products. I found the quality level of this vise to be better than I expected for the price. I think a lot of the people who buy these things need to temper their expectations a little. For under $60 you're not going to get a production-grade piece that's accurate to a thousandth of an inch. What you do get is a decent quality vise that can position your work with reasonable precision. I found that drill press vises tend to fall in to 4 categories: 1) poorly machined cheap junk; 2) better quality at a reasonable price (this product fits here); 3) the same quality but with a different name brand at twice the price; and 4) high precision manufacture for hundreds of dollars. My vise arrived in perfect shape. It was easy to assemble. With a little lubrication and some fine tuning to the tension adjustment screws I quickly had it set up to my preferences. The only problem was... my drill press was too small to mount it! Long story short, after a bit of research I actually ended up buying a new drill press from Wen also. I got the Wen 4212 benchtop drill press and I couldn't be happier. That's a separate review, but suffice to say that nothing near that price point came even close to the features or quality and I'm very satisfied.

Bueno calidad buena Se lo pedi a mi hermano y llego bien Aunque debe estar sujeto a una base muy robusta para evitar movimientos

This is made to a low price point. Both the sliding screws/shafts are bent, which in practise makes it's hard to turn with a point of easy turn. I'm keeping it bcos well there's nothing out there that competes on price, even though the quality is pretty low. I tried bending the screws so that the sliding mechanism was more consistent, however that caused more variation. The actual vise is good, just the sliding mechanism is unsatisfactory.

A bit rough around the edges , not the best for precision work. All it needs is a bit of love and a big hammer

Very Happy with slide vice, small bit of backlash from bottom slide due to threaded guide not fixed but a floating pin other then that its great value for money.

Buena calidad fácil de usar