Clamps,Clamps, Clamps, whats the difference?

[Jay Jeffery]

so is there any rule of thumb for which style to use? f-clamp or parallel-jaw-clamp?

I have a bunch of parallel-jaw, and a few of the irwin quick grips... I also bought four orange quick-grip-style from HF... (with handles that bend and a small plastic button for release.. they are harbor frightful, but cheap). I don't have any f-clamps yet. how about those wooden handscrews... any suggestions on what a good clamp herd looks like for building stuff like tables, bookcases, benches, beds, etc...

Parallel clamps are really only good for woodworking, but they do a wonderful job of squeezing out glue with a lot of force, while not messing up the surface. They can be award to handle sometimes. They are an expensive specialty clamp, but they do such a good job at what they do, you cannot have enough of them.

Heavy-duty F clamps and C-clamps are more versatile and are great for things beyond just gluing wood. They can clamp around things, are great for holding pieces down, gluing them together and a variety of other tasks. Many vehicles require a good C-clamp to change out brake pads. You can't just put the pads right on wood and expect them to leave it looking good. If you want a mark-free clamping experience you have to use a block or caul of some kind, or at least a rubber pad. A good selection of these is an important part of any tool set, but a woodworker need not go overboard.

Smaller F-clamps and C-clamps are great for small projects. I got a 15 pc set of really cheap Bessey clamps at Lowes a few years ago for $20. They aren't any better than the good HF clamps. But having many clamps usually means more than having a few nice ones, and often a light clamp is all you need. Some projects aren't big enough to support 15 pounds of steel.

Those wooden clamps are great for clamping irregular angles, but they are awkward for most applications.

[Lee Schierer]

The best clamps are the ones you have when you need them and they get the job done. Pressure is pressure no matter which clamp applies it. Go with what your budget allows.

[Kent A Bathurst]

so is there any rule of thumb for which style to use? f-clamp or parallel-jaw-clamp? ...

No rule of thumb, in IMO, you use whatcha got. Some styles are better than others for specific applications, but when I got started, I got a dozen or so Pony 3/4" pipe clamp sets, plus a buncha black pipe at different lengths from 24" to 96". $$ was the main driver. With a good set of cauls (do a search here - you'll see a lot of good info on making your own, and a coupla food fights) the pipe clamps did me well in everything, including repro Stickley bookcases.

Now, of course, I got a number of all types. My experience, FWIW - cheap clamps don't save you $$, they waste $$. I found this out at the absolute worst possible time - in the middle of a mission-critical glue-up.

[Jack Wilson]

Was in loews again today and checked a little more, some of the Bessy clamps are from China, while others are from Germany.

[Tony Shea]

Jorgenson are probably my favorites, especially the parrallel bar clamp. I think Jorgenson parallels are made much better than the Bessey's and the sliding mechanism doesn't let free like the Bessey's do. I honestly hate handling my Bessey parallels as the jaws are constantly slaming open without operating the open mechanism. The Jorgy's are much better. As for F clamps, the price is the only reason for liking the Jorgs better. The Bessey's are nice but not enough to make me spend more for them. They both do the job just as well with no smashed knuckles like I get from the Bessey parallels. Yes I hate them.

[Michael MacDonald]

No rule of thumb, in IMO, you use whatcha got. Some styles are better than others for specific applications, but when I got started, I got a dozen or so Pony 3/4" pipe clamp sets, plus a buncha black pipe at different lengths from 24" to 96". $$ was the main driver. With a good set of cauls (do a search here - you'll see a lot of good info on making your own, and a coupla food fights) the pipe clamps did me well in everything, including repro Stickley bookcases.

yeah... I think I need to get a few of the pipe clamp sets... I will need to glue up a 80" bench in the next few weeks, and don't have the clamps for it now... thanks for the tips...

[Neil Brooks]

Jorgenson are probably my favorites, especially the parrallel bar clamp. I think Jorgenson parallels are made much better than the Bessey's and the sliding mechanism doesn't let free like the Bessey's do. I honestly hate handling my Bessey parallels as the jaws are constantly slaming open without operating the open mechanism. The Jorgy's are much better. As for F clamps, the price is the only reason for liking the Jorgs better. The Bessey's are nice but not enough to make me spend more for them. They both do the job just as well with no smashed knuckles like I get from the Bessey parallels. Yes I hate them.

If you have any of the Besseys ... and you want to get rid of them ... I'm here for you

[Kent A Bathurst]

yeah... I think I need to get a few of the pipe clamp sets... I will need to glue up a 80" bench in the next few weeks, and don't have the clamps for it now... thanks for the tips...

Well, Michael - let me tell you the end game....just a sec..........had to go around the corner to count.......there we go..... You can obviously move the ponies from pipe-to-pipe, as project + size changes. I have accumulated 28 different pipe sections in 4 lengths, and sometime over the last 12 years some lazy b*$*&#d went and bought ponies for all of them - hanging on the rack with the 10 Bessy + Gross stabil parallels - and all the F-style, C-clamps, handscrews, quik-clamps........where in the heck did all of those come from??? Who let that guy in the shop????

[John Harden]

+1 to the guys who say buy what you need. I must have 50 Bessey K body's for glue ups of panels, etc. They're my favorite, but they're expensive. I picked up a bunch on sale at WW shows, etc., which made them more affordable.

Recently I needed a whole mess of 6" F clamps for some bent lamination work. Bought about 80 of them from Harbor Freight for $1.99 apiece. You can't beat that price and their new, updated design with the rubber handles is WAY better than their old design, where the clamp head would often slip. They've performed great for me. Not a problem with a single one of them.

Regards,

John

[Rod Sheridan]

I have many Bessey K body clamps and some Jorgensen pipe clamps.

The Bessey clamps are the go to clamps, the pipe clamps are for when I run out of Bessey clamps.......Rod.

[Anthony Scott]

Well, that didn't take long to devolve in to China bashing.

"...the "Bessey" clamps sold at Lowes are made in China..."

Ahhhh... China. Is there no end to the indignity?

[Igor Petrenko]

As far as that style of clamp, I have the Dark Blue clamps from Harbor Freight (pic below) and they work very well. I like them a lot. I have some gray ones from HF and they are junk for the most part.
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=96214

Those are fantastic. Pure HF gem no quality sacrificed. Next time they run a sale I will get 50x more of those.

[Tony Shea]

If you have any of the Besseys ... and you want to get rid of them ... I'm here for you

I actually already pawned them off on my buddy who is starting to come to the same conclusion about them as I did. I just love the Jorgs' CabinetMasters and think they're the cats ass! Really one of the best designed clamps out there. And I read a review, PWW mag i believe, that rated these clamps as one of the best. They seemed to feel the same way as I did about the Bessy K body's. They just have a poor latch in the relaxed posistion. They do work well other than that feature.

I was at Lowes today and checked out their Bessy stock and noticed they had both the German made and China made styles. Odviously the German mades were much nicer. My point being is that the China Bessey's have completely abandoned the original Bessey design that incorporates a clutch free system. They all have the metal clutch similar to most other F style clamps. Which IMO doesn't deserve to where Bessey's name as they aren't even the same style F clamp. I was fairly dissapointed that Bessey puts their name to these. Oh well, child labor sells I guess.

[John Denture]

Those are fantastic. Pure HF gem no quality sacrificed. Next time they run a sale I will get 50x more of those.

I just looked at those the other day- they have so much play in the slider that the two jaws can be displaced by 1/2 of the diameter of the pads- this would be a nightmare as the jaws aren't clamping parallel anymore. Glue-ups already require three hands- having to align the clamp while tightening it down is ridiculous.

I also noticed that out of 5 I pulled off the rack, two of them had sticky clutches that wouldn't stay engaged (probably burrs from poor castings or stampings).

Not only that, they wanted $6.00 for an 18" clamp, which is half the price of a Jorgensen.

No thanks.

[Neil Brooks]

I actually already pawned them off on my buddy who is starting to come to the same conclusion about them as I did. I just love the Jorgs' CabinetMasters and think they're the cats ass! Really one of the best designed clamps out there. And I read a review, PWW mag i believe, that rated these clamps as one of the best.

Here I was ... humble ... hat in hand ... looking for a freebie, and ... I think you just ended up costing me money

Sexy little numbers ... ayup ... they are.



You can never have too many.....