Woodworker's Journal 2009-33-2, страница 68

Today's Shop

Using eccentric cam action to create clamping pressure, lever-action cam clamps are quick and easy to tighten. They're useful both for holding parts during machining and for glue-up operations.

Bench Clamps and Hold-downs

These devices hold workpieces securely to your benchtop during hand tool or machine operations. Many hold-downs, including Jorgensen's Style No. 1600 hold-downs and Veritas' Surface Clamp, install into the 3/4-in.-diameter holes found in most workbenches: Install the hold-down clamp in a hole, tighten it over the workpiece, and you're ready to go. A more complicated but elegant hold-down solution is the V-clamp, which uses suction to holds parts firmly to the bench. Vacuum is supplied either with a vacuum pump or a special valve that turns compressed air pressure into suction.

Miter Clamps

Also called corner or angle clamps, miter clamps are specifically designed to press mitered or butted

Edge clamps (bottom) are for gluing on edge trim and moldings; installation clamps (top) are designed to hold cabinets during installation.

corners together and keep them aligned during gluing and/or fastening. The MLCS Can-Do and Pony Rapid Acting Miter Clamp are like small vises that form 90° corners, even with members of different thicknesses. To quickly clamp all four corners of a picture frame, chair frame, shadowbox, etc. at once, choose a frame clamp, such as the Veritas 4-Way Speed Clamp or Woodpecker's production-oriented Square, Wedge and Toggle Clamping Set.

For clamping non-square corners, Bessey's MCX miter angle clamps attach to frame or carcass members, then regular bar clamps are used to clamp corners at a variety of angles. Bessey's Irregular Clamp Set allows even more versatile angle clamping jobs, such as fastening a down-angled stair railing to a newel post.

Edge and Installation Clamps

Most commonly used to apply edge banding to plywood or MDF shelves, doors, cabinet panels, etc., edge clamps are also useful for strip

Band clamps work well for gluing up rectangular projects like boxes and chests, but they also can clamp round or irregular shapes with ease.

lamination work. Jorgensen's basic edge clamps look like a C-clamp with three screws: Two grip the board/panel while the third presses the edge. Bessey's One-Hand Edge Clamps have a single handscrew that simultaneously adjusts the clamp to the thickness of the panel and applies pressure to the edge, making them great for production applications. Although the Pony Euro Claw and Cabinet Claw clamps look and function somewhat like edge clamps, they're actually specialized installation clamps, designed for clamping and fastening adjacent cabinets together during installation.

Clamping Accessories

Here is a selection of some useful accessories that work with your clamps, to make assemblies and glue-ups go more smoothly:

Clamp pads protect workpieces from being dented by metal clamp heads. In lieu of making your own pads from scraps, you can buy rubbery plastic pads that slip over the jaw surfaces of various bar and pipe clamps. Rockler's Sure-Foot™ conversion pads not only cover a pipe clamp's jaws, but

Miter clamps are terrific not only for aligning and clamping miter joints, but for butt joints and other corner connections as well.

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April 2009 Woodworker's Journal