[...snip...]

The "Pittsburgh" brand of bar clamps (Harbor Freight's
house brand) are almost as good as Jorgensen, and are
often on sale for a pittance.

John


I'm far from the expert level many of you woodworkers but I also agree
with the HF clamps. I've been using many of them for many functions for
many years applying great pressure and thus far they are still
performing well. I too am also wondering what it is that the OP is doing
to break them.

I like Bessy F style clamps for general purpose clamping. For larger
reach Shop Fox has a pretty good F clamp for much less than the
equivalent Bessey. The plastic pads aren't in the same class, get
knocked off easily, but they are OK. If you use cauls you can get rid
of the pads.

http://www.amazon.com/Shop-Fox-D2918.../dp/B005W0UKY4

If you make a set of gently curved convex cauls in various lengths you
can get good clamping results with two clamps.

I note that in a recent Fine Woodworking article that Michael Fortune
was doing some bent lamination (which needs a lot of clamps) and he
was using a bunch of what looks to be the old style (wood handle) HF
Pittsburg F clamps. I have a bunch of those and the new rubber grip
ones and find them to be quite useful. The little rubber pads on them
are not so useful. They are frequently on sale for 50% off an already
low price. If they are good enough for Michael Fortune...

I have a few HP Pittburge clamps that are 24" and longer and regret
getting those. They flex too much to provide the clamping pressure I'd
like to get.