Clamps, you can never have enough of them. That is one of
the universal laws of woodworking. You will always run into a situation where
you either need more clamps or the ones you have are too short.
As you start building your clamp set, you will need several
different styles. I’ll just touch on the basics and what works for me.
Small F-style clamps are designed for small work. The decent
ones will have a rigid metal bar (usually chromed or black) with a fixed arm on
the end. The piece that slides on the bar will have threaded rod with a pad on
one end and a handle on the other. When using you will want to turn the handle
until the pad is just about all the way back. These are usually pretty bullet
proof, no matter who makes them, however, the cheaper brands will flex under
pressure. One good way to check the quality is if you can flex the bar, don’t
buy it. I have a lot of these, mainly Jorgensen and some from Rockler both work
equally well.
Pipe clamps are one of the best values in the market today.
They are designed to be attached to either black iron or galvanized pipe. They
come in two sizes based on size of the pipe. The pipe used will be in either ½
or ¾ in pipe. The clamp comes in 3 pieces, the head piece, the adjustable foot
and what looks like a spring. You can buy the pipe in various lengths from the
local box store and it will come with the ends of the pipes pre-threaded. The
head piece will screw on one end, the foot piece will slide on the other (note,
there will be a spring loaded lever that will hold the foot in place, it can be
tricky to slide on the first time) and lastly the spring will screw on the
opposite end. This is to keep the foot from sliding off the clamp. The nice
part is if you need a longer clamp, you just need a longer pipe. In my shop, I have several sets in both sizes.
Parallel clamps are very popular today. They are
distinguished by the large plastic boxes covering the head piece and the foot.
They work very similar to the F-style clamp in that the adjustment is made on
the sliding head of the clamp and the foot is stationary. Parallel clamps excel in helping keep work
square during glue up. The large plastic covers also help spread the force of
the clamp over a larger area and minimize clamp marks that are a common problem
with F-style and Pipe clamps.
There are several other style of clamps but these tend to be
more specialized. There are band clamps that are very similar to cargo tie down
straps; wooden parallel or hand screw clamps are large wooden blocks with two
threaded rods to adjust the clamp; and Spring clamps which work like a lot like
spring loaded clothes pins.
A few things to keep in mind when buying clamps; a lot of
the very cheap Asian clamps are poorly cast and have weak metal. I tried a set
of four and three broke when put under normal clamping pressure. I also avoid
aluminum bar clamps. My wife gave me a set for Christmas one year and they
didn’t last too long. There are several good brands out there from which to
choose, it doesn’t matter what the brand is as long as it is well made.
Shopping Tip, buy clamps in sets of four. You almost never
use and odd number of clamps during a glue up.
