clamping Quistion, and one tip

[minowevie]

thank you all for your replys. and good advice. I finaly finished this project. with alittle help from my friends here. learned alot on this one. as soon as i put my last coat of finish on i will post a picture. still need the mirror cut. i will use these tips on my next MORE fragil piece. lol. your friend Evie

[PiALaModem]

When gluing a joint using yellow wood glue (whatever brand), you don't need to squeeze it to death, you just have to hold the pieces in firm contact at the correct orientation. Don't use so much glue that it wants to squeeze out when you put things together. A piece of masking tape, as sugggested, or clothespin or those little paperclamps from the office supply megamart are all perfectly adequate. The important function of clamps is positioning, not pressure. Only when joints are loose and need pressure to squeeze them into position do clamps need to do more.

[CanadianScroller]

Sometimes when I need to clamp smaller parts or parts bigger than my clamps I take an old piece of plywood.
I drive brads or small nails into the ply and place the parts I am glueing against them. Then I take the second part place it on the first and drive a brad into the plywood to wedge it in place.
It works really well for repairing fretwork.
You can put wax paper under the fretwork to stop the glue from sticking the whole project to the ply.
Just think of the ply as a giant pin cushion.
I bet you could use pegboard with some offset cams in various holes too.

[lucky788scroller]

Hun, its Black Acacia .Do you have enought strength in the wood to be able to let weight piled on it hold it until the glue sets? Ive used the rubber bands,as well as masking tape too,but Like Bill said,somtimes just hand pressure for a couple minutes is faster then fumbling around with a clamp,especially if the clamp flops on the floor when you go to grab it.Theres a good discussion on gluing on here on another thread that talks about the tacky glue mentioned. I think you would be pleased with it. I prefer the Aleenes in the silver bottle,its about the same as the brown/gold bottle,but a little bit quicker setting. I also thing the cleanup with the tacky glue is easier then woodglue because you can sort of scrape it off when its almost totally clear, and it rolls up off the wood much like rubber cement does. I also have glued after danish oil coating before, although I wouldnt reccomend it,I just forgot a piece to a clock and realized it when cleaning up my finishing supplies One other clamping thing you can try is clamping a longer piece from one side to the other to hold the middle,adding a little spacer at the piece you want the pressure on.

[William Young (SE BC)]

Yes rubber bands and masking tape can be great little clamps.
If the faces of the pieces you are fitting together are nicely matched to one another you can just use Aleene's Tacky glue (brown bottle) and put it on and hold the piece for a minute or two at the most and let go and you're done.
The minute you are holding it while it bonds is not wasted because it would probably take longer than that fiddling around with clamping if it is small pieces. .
I do use clamps but not on small pieces of fretwork. Only on long ones where my hands won't reach long enough to hold even pressure on the joint.
W.Y.

[jttheclockman]

Evie

I tried my hardest to follow what you were saying but sorry no luck. The oil and gluing thing I can answer. It is always better to glue bare wood to bare wood. You will get maximum bonding. There are instances this is not possible. But if you are just oiling you can alway dip the piece and it will get into every nook and cranny.

The clamping thing not sure what you want to clamp. If you can give us a little idea it would help. There are times when you invent clamps. You can hot melt pieces of scrap wood to pieces and clamp that way. Rubber bands make good clamps. Masking tape makes agood clamp. Sometimes just putting weight on a piece works. Sorry to be so vague but did not understand what you said.

[minowevie]

OK< guys. I didn't know where this belongs. so I posted it here. I have not read many things on clamping. and that seems to be the thing that is the hardest for me. so far I haven't had too many probleams , but now I am making a project that is very fragil. the fret work was easy. but the wood is so fragile that it wonts to break so easy. don't know what kind it is. my hubbby said it is , sorry about spilling ok , Black Arcahsa. snaps in a hart beet.even though i soacked it in wood lock. it still wonted to warp. any way the clamping has been a real challenge.HOW in the world do you guys clamp. the probeam I am haveing is, the clamps just are not deep enouph to reach the inside . ( TIP )... I use alot of 4" bar clamps. and find it easy to file the split pins off or punch them out , as to put the barr in though the fret work, then add the handale and clamp down. But. now I need to get to another shelf that has no way to get to the midale of the shelf. and there is no way to put a nother piece of wood across the brim of the outer edg, for clamping. for there is alot of fret work there that might break. . hope you can understand this hen scrathing an help me out. Evie.