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Soft jaws are a must have for me, they make a vise many times more useful. But other shapes tend to make the jaws buckle or slip. Less so if the jaws keep slipping on odd shaped objects.These jaws have several preformed grooves for holding round stock. Square and rectangular objects also stay well. High power Neodymium magnets are easy to get and not very expensive, so it's a pity they didn't provide them. I replaced the originals with very powerful N42 magnets, improving their performance considerably.
I agree with the other reviewer,(12/9/05) these don't have a strong magnetic hold but this is not a huge problem. They do a fine job preventing marring of any delicate items needing to be secured. Get them at Lowes for around $8.
Bought this a while back and have been a little disappointed. They hold material in a wide array of shapes securely and have never damaged anything I have had clamped. The attraction between the material used for the jaws is actually stronger than the magnets such that closing your vice (with nothing in it) and then reopening causes the two jaws to stick together and then fall to the ground.
Had to clean the jaws about four times (with a scrub brush and dishwashing liquid) before the yellow stopped showing up in the rinse water. I fixed this problem by digging the magnets out and replacing them with like-sized rare earth magnets (held in place with a dab of silicone). The first problem was that taking it out of the package turned my hands yellow.
Highly annoying. Fortunately, it hasn't presented a problem since -- no bleed into items being clamped. The other problem is that the magnets used are woefully underpowered.
Now the jaws will actually stay attached to the vise.With those issues solved, the jaws have performed well. Just didn't expect so much fettling before the product was useable.
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