In article ,
ntiSpam (Ksu93dlv) wrote:

I'm building an activity table for my son approximately 36"x60" using #20
biscuits for the joints on the four table legs. Joining the short sides was
easy because I have a couple 40" bar clamps. How can I do the long sides
though? I don't have any bar clamps longer than 40". I was thinking of
assembling the sides and then pushing them up against a wall with something
heavy against them. Any suggestions?

In a pinch, I've banged together a frame from 2x4's that's longer than
the thing I needed to clamp and turned some of my one-handed clamps
around into the spreader configuration:


+-----------------------Frame--------------------------+
| |
|===========Workpiece==================|---Spreader---||
| | ||
+------------------------------------------------------+

It's ugly, not particularly powerful, and a bit awkward. On the other
hand, you can probably do it with stuff you've already got laying
around. It costs nothing to build because you can reuse the 2x4's when
you're done. If you're really cheap like me, you can even reuse the
screws :-)

Lee Valley's panel clamps

http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.a...1,43838,47843&
abspage=1&ccurrency=3&SID=

are a somewhat classier version of this idea, but require that you apply
a crowbar to your wallet.