Clamping Cauls from Scrap 2x4s

Dave, what's the deal with cauls? Where do you use these babies? Well, obviously in glue ups, the longer ones I'll use for example, putting an edge on a piece of plywood. Because it's hard when you're banding plywood and you'd have to have a clamp about every inch in order to really get them to close. Because the edging is so thin it doesn't. Spread its own, weight. Right. So this spreads out the clamping pressure evenly allows you to get by with fewer clamps so you can do, do more with less and they're just, they're handy in general. Now I have a series of sizes here. These are all made from scrap two-by-fours. So that's pretty cool that in their first life, these were dimensional two-by-fours. What's the machining process? Well, I'll take them I'll cut them to length and then the length that I want, 23 inches I use typically for like a kitchen base. And in that case, what we're talking about is drawing the case side and the case side against the bottom shelf Just like this yep Because it's so hard to get a clamp obviously in the middle of something. And if you don't, it's possible that the case side and the shelf being here, the case side is bowed out in the center because you don't have clamp pressure. So what I do is I'll cut the two-by-fours and of course they are not necessarily known for being nice and straight and true. Come on. But I will then take them to the joiner and planar and just take them down to where they're nice and true and square. Is part of the key to this working that they have to be older two-by-fours So they've had the opportunity to maybe sit around for a while they've been in the shop for a while? If you do use new ones, you want them to sit around the shop and acclimate for a while because they'll move on. So the point of that is don't go buy 4 two-by-fours and make them into cauls tomorrow. Well the other thing I like is old two-by-fours the grain is much tighter. The wood is much denser I mean, you can just see it on this piece versus this guy. Yeah well, and you can, yeah. The densitometer is the weight diameter. All right so you joint them, plane them, cut them. Yep, and then, you know, I'll break the edges just with a plane just a few passes of the plane just makes them easier to handle and they won't splinter on you. And your directional arrows. What is that about? Well, after probably after a day or so you should cite down the top almost all of them will end up with some kind of a crown. Which is a good thing. It's a good thing and I always mark where that crown or that high spot is. You know, it's fairly slight, but what you want to do is in a deep, well, especially with kitchen cabinets like we were just talking about and a deep glue up like this, you put the crown towards the middle and that way, when you clamp here and here, you're going to be putting extra pressure there in the middle where you can't get a clamp. Yeah. Take advantage of that boat. Cool. Well the cauls are very handy. Obviously these were like free to make except for your labor. and we know that it's not worth anything anyway. So good tip. Thanks Dave.