Self guide

What is the collective noun for clamps

A security?
A press?
A constriction?

Ill go with a tension of clamps for now.

There seem to be as many ways of clamping laps together as there are clinker boat builders. Some use specifically designed lap clamps. Others opt for more prosaic off-the-shelf alternatives like deep-throat F clamps or carpenters hand clamps.

Leather suggests what he calls nippers. Two straight pieces of wood joined with a bolt and tensioned with a wedge between their outer ends. I like the simplicity; quick to make, little to break.

Others make their own elegantly curved, leather hinged devices with beautifully shaped handles. Greg Rossel has designs for them in Building Small Boats. You can buy the handle nuts for them here. I have a lot of sympathy with the romance of it all but theres only so far Im prepared to go with recursive workshopping and I dont know how much better these will do the job than a g cramp and a pad.

Eric Hvalsoe has the ultimate extrapolation of this but to be fair to him he says he got them from a friend. Two lovely lap clamps with an eccentric cam that tightens them onto the joint. These Brenne clamps (named for their designer) were written up in Woodenboat 29 by Björn Skauge. Ill have to make some of these one day but theres more purposeful pencil-sharpening to be done before then.

If, like me, youd rather get to the building Duck Trap will sell you some pretty, serviceable lapclamps.

The boys at Hilmark take a much more pragmatic approach using off-the-shelf, long-reach, metal locking clamps. They seem to have a lot of them. A hold of clamps? Much better. Much more nautical.