Ran out of clamps... (w/pics)

[David Eisan]

I spent the day rough cutting, planing, jointing and gluing up the hard maple panels that I need for the drawers in my parents kitchen.

http://www.federatedtool.com/david/img/mejointing.jpg

After the 12th glue up, I started to run out of clamps, I even reached for the 60" and 80" pair then finally ran out of clamps on the 14th panel.

http://www.federatedtool.com/david/img/14panels.jpg

Tomorrow is another day...

David.

Every neighbourhood has one, in mine, I'm him.

[Don Abele]

David, looks like you have your Bessey's well out numbered with GS clamps. Maybe you need to get more :p

Be well,

Doc

[Ken Garlock]

Your last picture looks like an army of toy soldiers ready for battle. :)

I see you are using a bunch of Gross-Stabil clamps. I just bought some on close out, and I must say that I am impressed with them. I think that I may just prefer them over the Bessy Ks. What is your opinion of the G-S clamps?

Looks like you have your work cut out for you, keep a plugg'n :cool:

[Carole Valentine]

Newbie question...you can get away with just two clamps per panel? I was told I had to have at least three (one on each end and one in the middle) and preferably more! I figured that at that rate, I would be 110 by the time I collected enough clamps to do more than two or maybe three panels! :eek:

[Jack Hogoboom]

Like seeing those GS clamps!! Mine arrived on Friday. Have to find a place to put them all. Guess I could glue up a few panels too....

Jack

[Greg Heppeard]

David,

I'd like to point out something I learned from my GS rep this weekend. If you turn your clamps a quarter of a turn on your panels, you will contact the edge of the panel with more clamp surface. The squareness of the clamp of both the Bessy and the GS are great and you shouldn't have a problem. The only problem I can see is, I'm not sure if they would stand on end as well. I haven't tried it yet, but plan to really soon.

[John Miliunas]

Wow! Busy fella', I'd say. :) Yup, you got a LOT of panels to do there and looks like you got yourself a fair number of clamps for the job. FWIW, I prefer the GS over any clamp I have, including the Bessey's, though they run a real close second! Great progress there, David. :cool:

[Norman Hitt]

You've been a busy boy David.

We've sure come a long way on clamping equipment and I for one am glad. I sometimes reflect that before I started getting pipe clamps, and bar clamps an Jorgy cabinet masters, and Bessys, that I (being a poor kid), used to clamp up panels using 2 x 4's with a short 2 x 4 block screwed to it on each edge of the panel and then use wedges to tighten them up. I can tell you that I Like Being Spoiled with this new fangled technology, so it looks like you're gonna have to either slow down, work shorter days or (Tee Hee) BUY MORE CLAMPS.

Keep up the good work, as I know your parents are gonna appreciate it.

[Harry Rigg]

Carole: I usually figure 2 clamps for 24 inches, but instead of a hard and fast rule I'd be guided by the way the boards come together and the glue line looked. For a middle clamp of three, I'd put it on the opposite surface of the panel from the first two. That's mostly habit, since I'm not sure it's really required with the parallel body clamps. Other folks with greater experience may (probably will) have different opinions.

Harry

[David Rose]

Greg, that's the way I've always used Bessys. I guess I started doing that partly to keep the clamps from falling over when I was frantically gluing up. :o However, if the portion of your clamp head that sticks out to the side of the bar is narrower than your panel is thick, you will get more tendency for the panel to bow (up in the middle away from the bars). Hence folks recommending a clamp on the bottom then the next on the top and so on. Or clamp the panel to the bar between with heads with a small clamp. With the staggered clamps, they stand up OK, but they are not supported well enough to bump.

David


David,

I'd like to point out something I learned from my GS rep this weekend. If you turn your clamps a quarter of a turn on your panels, you will contact the edge of the panel with more clamp surface. The squareness of the clamp of both the Bessy and the GS are great and you shouldn't have a problem. The only problem I can see is, I'm not sure if they would stand on end as well. I haven't tried it yet, but plan to really soon.

[Kent Cori]

David,

Nice collection of clamps! So how did your back feel the next day after hauling around all those heavy buggers?