Emmert vise positioning

There are two ways a pattern makers vise can be mounted on a bench. It can either stand proud of the bench
or be let into it. I chose to let my vise into my bench.


Here the vise is in what I am calling the home position. The arrow indicates the plane that the vise will not spin freely in.	Here is an example of a position that would not be possible with the vise let into the bench

In order to wind up with the vise in this position the vise must be tipped up (shown in the picture to the right), spun, and dropped back down.	Spin the vise 90° in the plane show by the arror while in this position before dropping it back down

The images were "borrowed" from a wonderful page of Emmert information.

Update:Here are pictures of my bench and vise

Here is text I posted when trying to describe this:

Mark van Roojen wrote:

> I have seen them mounted in, but I think that the mortise then has to be 
> relieved to let it turn fully.  I think Russ Allen has done that and I'm 
> sure he'll chime in if he sees this.

I've been struggling with exactly how to explain this.  A picture
or two would help but I don't have a decent digital camera.  Instead
I stole the images from John Gunterman's Emmert page (apologies
to John) and attempted to annotate them.  See 
http://home.xnet.com/~rcallen/pmkr/emmert101.htm  Here's my
attempt to explain it without pictures:

Mark is right- the vise can't do all its tricks when it is let into the 
bench top with a French fit (see archive message 24119).  The vise won't 
spin in the plane perpendicular to the bench top when in it's home
position.  Start with the vise in the home position and the handle
running horizontally.  You couldn't move the handle 10 degrees and then
spin the vise body to match that angle.  The French fitting didn't
remove enough wood to make this possible.  I haven't found a need
to position the vise like this, YMMV.  

  You can raise the vise up where it's parallel to the
bench top and raised slightly above it.  You can then spin the vise 90
degrees and then drop it back down.  The vise would now be in the
same position as if you had been able to rotate it 90 degrees in
its home position. 

I hope this helps!
Russ Allen  
Member of the fraternal order of French fitted emmert knock offs

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