Hi everybody, thanks for all of the great comments, I ordered
the deluxe package yesterday and am anxiously awaiting it’s
arrival. I appreciate the time that everybody took to e-mail me
about this I look forward to hearing more advice and suggestions
about innovative tricks with the system. Thanks again Cary
Cary James Designs
P.O.Box 336 Manuels,Newfoundland
Canada
A1W 1M9
a69rmv@plato.ucs.mun.ca
G’day; I am highly intrigued by all the ‘raving’ over the
Benchmate, and I would like someone to point me to some site or
other where I could see what it looks like. Before it became a
thread in Orchid, I had never heard of it, and like I said, am
intrigued and mystified by what it could look like and do. –
/\ John Burgess
/ /
/ / Johnb@ts.co.nz
/ /__|\
(_______) I often wonder what it ish the vintner buysh one
half so precioush ash the goodsh they shell. Hic.
You don’t solder directly in the ring clamp, as it’s plastic
line jaws obviously wouldn’t like that. But the system comes
with simple “leaf spring” type clamps, one flat ended, the other
pointed, almost like large blunt tweezers. they fit in the ring
clamp, and being thin sheet metal, don’t conduct enought heat to
the jaws of the ring clamp to harm the plastic. Not so good for
extended jobs, but fine for a retip or a sizing, etc. they have
and extension of this simple type of clamp which has spring
loaded jaws lined with transite. Occasionally useful, but by
far, most of the time I use either the soldering station held in
the ring clamp, or the larger soldering station that replaces the
ring clamp on the mounting plate. The ring clamp soldering
station has the advantage of then being able to tilt and swivel
and move around however you need, but it mounts several inches
higher up, which on some benches may be uncomfortably high up
for some people or uses. The larger soldering station has feet,
as well as a mounting plate attachement, so it can just sit on
your benchtop as well as affix to the mounting plate if you wish.
Nice system. About the only real problem I have with it, and
for me this is a significant problem, is that I do a lot of work
with platinum. Thus, I’ve replaced the steel tweezer jaws in my
tweezers with the optional carbide jaws. So far, so good. They
work well. But carbide, unlike steel, is a wonderful conductor
of heat. And working platinum, those jaws get significant heat
input. Guess what… Those tweezer handles QUICKLY get well too
hot to handle. I’ve burned my poor fingers more times than I can
count on those damnably short little handles, when I forget to
use a towel to open the tweezers. And dragging a towel around
the soldering station knocks off solder, bits and pieces, etc.
I’m so used, after several decades, to the old style insulated
handle soldering tweezers in a third hand, that remembering that
these puppies are gonna be really hot after anything more than a
minor solder job seems to not always come automatically. Why, oh
why, GRS hasn’t come up with some simple little insulated handle
for those soldering tweezers is beyond me. I finally got tired
of burns and blisters from the damn things, and made my own. I
found a bit of surplus scrap phenolic tube, fairly heavy wall,
that by happenchance was very close in it’s inside diameter to
the diagonal (corner to corner) dimension of the tweezer stock.
So a half inch length of that tube, forced over the end of the
tweezer handle, now acts as a nice and effective insulator for
my tweezers. Trouble is, I only found enough of the stuff to do
two tweezers, and I’ve a system at both my bench at work and my
workbench at home. So the home setup is comfortable, and the one
at work is still unprotected. One of these days, I gotta go
looking for more of that phenolic tube. Of get a bit of solid
bar and bring out the drills or something. Yet another project
on the back burner…
The only other gripe I’ve got about the GRS system is that I
also bought, from SWEST, one of their drop in replacement inside
ring holders that fits in place of the normal ring clamp, using
the little plastic sleeve expanding inserts to hold a ring from
the inside of the shank. Nice idea. But they’ve used an
enormous big socket head screw to drive the inserts, making it
difficult to access the leading edge of the ring, and since one
mounting position this clamp allows is edge up, this then
effectively negates much of the usefulness of this mounting
position. fortunately, I’ve another such clamp, hand held, that
uses a more sensible type of screw that happens to have similar
threads, and I can mount rings using this competing sleeve/screw
setup on the GRS handle, and then work on the edges of the rings.
Silly oversight. So was the quality control on my particular
copy of the handle itself, with didn’t cleanly fit the holder
without some sanding down. Plus, the oxide finish on the thing
apparently didn’t get completed. Was a nice dull black. But it
came off on everything. Even after sanding down the handle a bit
to loosen the fit (mostly taking off a slight roughness on the
surface), and some light buffing, the handle, which is now only
grayish with most of that patina removed, STILL leaves dark
stains on my hands. Agrevating, to say the least. All in all,
though I’d say most of the GRS system is worth owning, I’d pass
on this inside ring clamp if I had it to do over. Lotta money
for not a lotta tool. But the rest of the system is a dream.
But other than those gripes, I’d have to say the benchmate
system overall is a wonderful tool. With some nerve damage to my
left hand that limits my grip strength, the benchmate greatly
increases what I can do with that hand, and I like it a great
deal. I still don’t us it for everything. I also have, and use,
normal wood ring clamps, which for many uses, like filing up
castings and simple quick stuff like that, are still quicker and
easier for me. The bench pin attachment gets as much, or more
use, with plain ring clamps than the actual GRS one. But for
when I need that stability, the GRS system is the best I’ve
tried. And aside from the aggrevating speed with which they
heat up, the soldering station setup is also very nice, and I’ve
not been tempted to use anything else I’ve seen out there…
Hope this helps.
Peter Rowe
Frank I am using a used B&L sterozoom 4, which has a low end
magnification of 7 and a high end magnification of 30, plus I
have 20x eyepieces and the 2x objective lens for a total mag of
120x. I find the low end plenty for 99% of my jewelry making and
stone setting tasks and the high end for gemstone viewing.
Brian
Mr Burgess, if you are looking for the Benchmate, Rio Grande
company has it. You can get a copy of their catalog and it is on
page 28/29. The price of the Benchmate basic kit is $155.00
US…the deluxe kit is 205.00…the benchmatr plus kit is
255.00.
Their address for requesting a copy of their catalog is:
RIO GRANDE
7500 Bluewater Road NW
Albuquerquue, NM 87121-1962
They have three different catalogs:
Tools
Display and packaging &
Gems and Findings
They also have an e-mail listing: info@riogrande.com or,
their web site:
Hope this will help you out…I’m looking at them myself. Kelly
@kelly_van_vleck
Brian and Frank and anyone:
How are you mounting the microscope to the bench?? Do you have
to have the Benchmate system??
TIA,
Roy
I use a Benchmate at our College here in Minneapolis and in my
own shop. On the ring clamp holder I have modified it to be
smaller in size so it will fit under more of the rings I work on.
I prefer on some jobs to have the ring rest on top of my clamp
(either wood or the benchmate, so I’ve made smaller ones).This
was done by taking it to a grinding machine and then sanding
machine. If anyone out there uses an engravers ball for setting
this is the next best thing.
There are two bars that the unit has been sold with also. One
comes straight out with no ability to adjust for height. The
other is a bar that can be adjusted up and down to fit your
preference. Make sure you get the adjustable one. Maybe the
straight one was an older unit. I also use the unit upside down
(or to the left of the clamp). That way the metal part that holds
the clamp is on the left away from my strong side. At least if I
set it up the way it looks in the brochure there is too much of
the unit on the right side for my comfort. It works either way
for you left handed folks.
I have also replaced the plastic clamp liners with leather. I
just glue on (with 2 part epoxy) two 1/4" thick pieces of
leather, tighten the clamp and let it dry. After it dries I saw
and file the excess leather and now I have a grip that works
closer to the wood ring clamp. The leather doesn’t last forever
but neither does the plastic ones and the leather doesn’t leave
any marks like I’ve seen from the plastic ones.
The inner expansion collet clamp works great for me in a couple
of ways. First at school it gives our close up camera a stable
focus so doesn’t have to be repositioned every time the piece is
moved. We do all our stone setting classes (channel, bezel, plate
& prong) with it. With either clamp the focus is great. I like
the bench pin attachment because it is fairly stable with a small
tap and changes to the benchmate quite quickly. I flip my
benchpin flat for piercing and angled for filing and the set
screw on the side is OK but I do tighten it with a pliers.
The best application I’ve found for the inner expansion clamp is
bezel setting stones. It allows you the ability to swing around
to tap the opposite side of your stone with out removing your
ring from the fixture. I still hammer my mandrel into my bench
front for some setting jobs but the bench mate makes it again
quicker and more stable. You can double up the inner plastic
collets for a fuller fit under your whoe ring for stability. This
takes a longer bolt, but they can be purchased at a local
hardware store. The one thing that I have noticed is that with
some rings if they are brittle, the inner expansion clamp may
crack them at the bottom where the spru is attached. I cast a lot
of deox silver and switched back to regular silver for rings I
set this way.
For bezel setting stones here are a couple of my tips. I usually
use a ponytail or braid rubber band to keep the stone in place.
It’s small and fits around the ring keeping the stone in place.
In the benchmate you have to put it on before you put the ring
into the clamp but that’s no big deal. It’s clean and the stone
doesn’t jump out. A second big tip is to make sure your stone
does not rock in the mounting. Take your fingers when the stone
is in place and push it up and down end to end. If it rocks like
a sea saw anywhere grind away the metal under the high spot until
it is flat. Sorry I never use a filler, it’s got to be flat in my
book.You will have a lot less broken stones that way (setting as
welll as after a few months or even years).
At school I have the opportunity to try out a lot of neat stuff
before I purchase things myself. I have benchmates at home and at
school. I promarily use them for setting and feel they are a good
investment.
Best Regards,
TR the Teacher & student
Roy, My microscope is not designed for a jeweler so i had to
modify. The scope has a stand with a 1/2 inch vertical rod that
it attaches to. I removed the stand, drilled a 1/2 inch hole in
my bench top, and bent a 1/2 inch aluminum rod in a modified S so
that it suspends the scope at a angle over the cut out of the
bench. I then mount my bench mate or bench pin in the cut out.I
bent 2 rod before i got the angles and lengths correct, but they
are cheap. Frank
Roy My microscope has a B&L base it mounts into and I clamp it to
the edge of my bench. It just hans over enough to center on the
benchmate. It is completely independent of the bench mate.
Ideally B&L makes a base with a long arm which would be more than
enough but I have not found a used one yet. Brian