BARREL VISE Reviews & Ratings

I needed to remove a tough barrel that just would not hold in my old wood-insert barrel vise. This was a great solution. A couple of Brownell's lead shims protected the finish on the barrel and provided more grip than I needed. I also use this as a general-purpose holder for drilling, polishing, refinishing, or anything else. A leather pad is enough protection and I don't ever worry about anything slipping or moving at all. Great price too!

Used this vise to remove a factory barrel from my Tikka action. This along with some of Brownells lead plate shims held the barrel tight enough that it didn't slip at all when I pounded on the universal action wrench with a shop sledge. Eight good hard whacks and the action spun free. Tikka factory barrels are notorious for being very difficult to remove. I highly recommend this product as it works well for the money.

I have a Savage 12 with a custom barrel on it, so torque was probably pretty low....40-60 ft lbs. I put the vise on with masking tape under it for scratch prevention. Taking the barrel off was a quick hammer smack. Putting it on was simple too with no barrel will movement. You will need an action wrench of some kind or the action will move when torquing the nut. This leads to the question of do you need a barrel vise. I think you do for removal, but not sure. I need it for working on shouldered barrels in the future. When the vise grand the barrel, it grabs in 4 lines of contact. This will be spread some with tape or a toilet paper roll as folks suggest. Overall, the vise works well and looks amazing. It is nice and smooth all over to reduce scratch potential. The aluminum top does flex some to mate to the exact barrel shape. Looking at witness marks on the tape, it had 4 very solid lines of grip on my barrel contour (Rem Varmint) Last, the price is right and it works.

I'm a wanna-be gunsmith. For PRS competitions, I decided to build my own "Remage" configuration (Savage-type barrel nut with Remington receiver). Other barrel vises required bushings or wood blocks that I wanted to avoid because of the time and expense to use them. This vise fit my needs exactly. First, it is compact and easy to mount on a workbench. Second, the finish Viper uses won't mar a barrel. I now use a cardboard (toilet paper roll) wrap just to be cautious, but the first rifle I assembled was a MTU profile S/S barrel (about .850" thickness) with no marks. It tightens using beefy 3/4" nuts and holds the barrel very well. I have not used it to remove a factory barrel - this takes a lot of holding power but it would probably work. There is one limitation, which will be obvious to some - the top plate is not intended to be removed. If you are working on a barrel that has iron sights, this could be an issue. My only compliant is that the second time I used it, the top plate and bolts were frozen. After about an hour, I was able to free them up and have not experienced that issue again. As far as value, I would have paid twice this price (just don't tell Brownell's that ...). ;-)

With just some pieces of cardboard box cutouts to prevent scratches, this thing holds on to the barrel like there's no tomorrow. You don't even need a workbench. I bought two set of 5" long 1/2" nuts, bolts, and washers, and mounted it directly onto a piece of 4x4 lumber. Using a breaker bar while either standing or sitting on the 4x4, I could remove the most stubbornly installed muzzle brake with ease. No need for bushings or any of that nonsense, either.

I needed a barrel vise to install a new Seekins handguard on my Ruger Precision rifle. After looking at several, I settled on this one based on all the reviews and I'm glad I did. Made of steel and iron, it should last a long time. Held the barrel solid as a rock . I was a bit concerned about damaging the finish on the barrel so I wrapped it in a piece of chamois cloth I had laying around and it still held solid. Torqued the bolts to 30 ft lbs and went to work. The red block will jam up on the bolts if you don't loosen the nuts evenly but other than that, it worked like a charm. Love it to pieces!!!

I Dont bother mounting this Vise to my Bench I mount it in one of my Vises mounted to my bench that way if I'm not mounting a barrel its out of the way, also it has never failed me on any barrel removal job its a strong vise once that barrels mounted in it its not going anywhere but on or off that reciever ,I have not found a barrel yet I could not use it on do yourself a favor and toss all the barrel vises with inserts etc or ones that will only take certain barrels off junk them and buy this one for 60 bucks it takes them all off.

Right tool for the right job. I used the BV to remove the barrel nut on a Ruger Precision .308, The BV held the barrel in place with no marring, the barrel nut "hard nut to crack, so they say" came off with ease. The stock barrel was replaces with a carbon fiber barrel with no marring during the torquing process. I am totally delighted with the BV.

Used this to remove a barrel on a late model stainless 700 action. Ran the nuts down with a Dewalt then finished with a box wrench on a straighter section of the barrel. I had no slipping problems once I realized I should tighten it way up. I'm now using it all the time for rifle work just to have a stable platform. Working an action out of the stock was always a pain.

I have only used the vise three times so far, but it has worked flawlessly every time. The vise did not twist or marr the finish on any of the barrels. I could not find any recommendations on how many ft. lbs. of torque to put on the nuts of the vise, so I started at 45 ft lbs and that was all it took. I probably could have gone down to 35 ft lbs, but 45 worked so I am sticking with it. One of the guns I was working on was an Ruger Precision Rifle. I read that the barrel nuts could be tough to release, but with this vise it was no problem.