In this video, I want to go over some tips for gluing solid wood panels
You can use these techniques for any kind of woodwork. And first take a look at this clamp here
This is just an F-clamp, nothing special about it. And you can use different sorts of clamps. They don't have to be very strong
But the idea of applying clamps here on the ends of glued panels
is to align the joints from one to the other. Now, that's not necessarily going to prevent any sort of a board-to-board mismatch further on
But the idea here is that you stabilize the end joints and then you can push or pull these boards into alignment up and down as needed
to get as smooth a transition as possible. The idea here is to get these boards as flat and in as good alignment as possible
so you minimize the amount of sanding that's necessary. Another thing I want to point out here is the arrangement of the main clamps that hold the panel together
You can see this pipe clamp goes underneath and there's another one further over in a similar orientation
That's the way you'd start to assemble a panel like this. You put the glue on the boards, you put the boards in these main clamps loosely
you stabilize the ends with the smaller clamps, and then you start to tighten these main clamps, the ones that go underneath
Now, as a final step, it's always a good idea to put clamps oriented on the top, too
So they're on the top and they're going down. Now, the idea there is to minimize any bowing that might develop in the panel
If you have clamps on the bottom and on the top, you're going to have a much better chance for getting a flat panel
Now, one more thing here. There's a fair amount of glue squeeze-out here, more than I'd like, actually
But the main thing, regardless of how much squeeze-out you have, don't let it dry fully on the panel
That'll make for a very hard sanding job later. But similarly, don't scrape this glue off too early, either
because that'll make for a very messy job. So when the glue is half hard, go at it with a putty knife
scrape most of it off, and you'll have a much easier time sanding that panel smooth later