Originally Posted by
BCRider
Bench vise....
Anyone doing much bike work at all and that has even a modestly set up permanent shop really owes it to themselves to get a decent bench vise. The vise is your best friend with the third hand you'll ever have.
If you don't have a permanent bench setup and have to work out of a tool kit which has to be put away to clear the room to serve dinner then that's different and you're stuck with having to resort to oddball tricks such as holding a wrench or vise grips between your knees. But with foldable benches such as B&D Workmates and the like on the market there are better options than contortions to do this.
Just push this thread back to the top, since I see this came up. Do you find these portable benches provide enough stability to get useful vise grips on them? Anyone have experience using one of
these or similar for a portable but useful workbench to do bike-specific work?
Re: cone adjustment; + another one on the Parktool on-the-bike method. I used to fumble around a lot with two cone wrenches and two adjustable wrenches, but doing it all with a single cone wrench and adjustable wrench on one side is far easier and faster. It also makes it easy adding grease to the bearings for a quick and dirty re-pack while minimizing the chance of having bearings dropping out all over the place. (I also invested in a grease gun a while back, which marked a major improvement for me in greasing everything that wasn't my hands, pants and face.)