Clamping table

Simple, effective and clever design. You got a great deal on those clamps!

-- Bob A in NJ

Great idea Robb!

-- Greg Mitchell--Lowell, AR--gdamitchell@sbcglobal.net

It looks like a great idea even if you did have to buy the clamps. I’ll think on the back stop.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

Great Clamping Station. Does the clamps give enough pressure on the glue line?

-- Karson Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com

Thanks everyone!

Bob, I realize now that I did get a great deal on the clamps. At the time that I bought them, I had no clue how expensive they were! A friend of mine and I bought a big box of them and split the winnings. A lot of them have glue on the threads of the bolts, but they clean up nicely with a wire brush, or, in the worst cases, a little heat from a torch and a wire brush.

Thos. : I’d really like to hear any ideas you come up with. All I’ve thought of so far is doing something like bench dogs, where I could pop in different stops for different widths. I’m not sure if that would be solid enough, though.

Karson, it seems to work pretty well, pressure-wise. As long as the clamps are adjusted individually to the proper fit, I haven’t had any delam. Because the clamps are a fixed distance from the surface of the table, they limit how thick the stock can be that I can glue up, though. I haven’t tried gluing anything thicker than about 2”, figuring that I’d be asking for delam if I did.

-- Robb

Robb,

“Any thoughts on how to make an easily adjustable, floating backstop that would still be sturdy”

Buy a number of T-tracks (Highland Hardware has good prices on them) and run them perpendicular to the clamps. Attach a fence milled square from a piece of hardwood. Put clamps on top of the fence that securely grab the base. If you look online for router table plans, esp. something like the Ultimate router station—to which there’s probably dozens—you’ll see ideas to borrow.

Gary

Here’s my idea. Remove the backstop and cut a couple of grooves in the base perpendicular to the clamps. Then use bolts that run through the grooves and the backstop with the nut on the top.

Very nice solution to the clamping dilemma, by the way.

-- Chelle http://artsgranddaughter.blogspot.com

Gary and Cheller, thanks for the great suggestions. I was daydreaming about different solutions at work today, but hadn’t reached any good conclusions. I’ll definitely give these some thought. There’s surely merit in borrowing from those router table plans. I hate to reinvent the wheel!

-- Robb

That’s a good idea, Robb!

-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)

Robb, this is a good idea. I can see the use for something like this for bending laminations, with a curved form and the clamps placed around it.

-- Tim -- http://tmuli.com

Tim, I wonder if you could put the clamps right in one of your steam boxes? Would that work?

-- Robb

What about saving some less than perfect strips that you have cut? You could glue up some in different thicknesses and use them as shims. That way you could put a solid backstop as far back as you can on the base & just stack up as many shims as you need & never have to re-adjust the clamps.

-- http://www.grandprairiewoodworks.com

Tim, that’s almost exactly where I’ve landed to date :). I just haven’t moved the backstop to the rear of the board yet. Maybe this spring, when the weather lets up. Thanks for the suggestion, and for taking a look at my project!

-- Robb