142 1VIDEO Clamp Cart Plans Tour

In this video I want to give you a tour of a project that I designed a number of years ago

I call it my clamp cart. I use it for a lot of things other than just storing my clamps, but you can see it here

This is the same rolling clamp cart that you've seen me use all through the course videos

It's got some old paint and glue on it and things. It's seen some miles since I originally built it, just before this photo

But it still works just as well. I'd really recommend you consider this project. It's quite easy to build, too

So the first thing to notice is that the cart is built around these blue wooden bins

There are two here. They're stackable bins. And then there's two more on the other side, too

Those hold small clamps and things. I would urge you to get your stackable plastic containers first, before you start building

Don't go ahead and just start cutting things according to the plans and materials list that I've provided

because you may not be able to find the right size of boxes to fit

So start with the boxes, and then make some, if necessary, make some adjustments to the size of the cart itself

You probably won't have to do much at all. It's just a little thing, but important to remember early on

Another thing I'd like you to look at here is this wall, this piece you see here

The main purpose of this is to provide an anchor point for some carriage bolts

There's one here, there's one here, and there's one here. These carriage bolts are long. They're so long, in fact, that I had to put a coupler on them

You can just see the little end of the coupler here. Just so that it's long enough, so I can put three clamps on each, the bolt continues in

This is the bolt, this is the connector. The connector connects to threaded rod, about here or so

and then goes on into this wall, and there's a nut and washer on both sides

So it pinches the wall, holds this rigid, so you can put your clamps on it

These are half-inch diameter bolts, and I wouldn't go any smaller. Nice and beefy, and they last well

Another thing you need to know about is the top. It's removable

It's not glued in place, held only with structural screws, so it's easy to replace when the time comes

And the time will come, because you're going to get glue, you're going to get paint on it

you're going to maybe chip the surface, because as I said, this is much more than just a storage place for clamps

It's actually a really great assembly cart as well, when you're putting together projects

Look down here. You see these are casters, they're lockable casters. A couple of things to say. First of all, get the good ones

These have actual rubber wheels, so they roll very well. Don't get the little wee hard plastic kind, the cheap kind you see on a lot of things

You'll want something substantial, fairly large in diameter, rubber wheels, and lockable

That little lever there, you push that down with your foot, it locks the caster

There is a habit of putting steerable casters, like this here at this end, this can swivel, this caster can swivel around

Steerable casters at one end, so say here and here, but then fixed casters, so they can't swivel, at the other end

I don't know why anybody does that, because it just makes it a lot harder to push this thing around

I strongly recommend swiveling casters on both ends. It works very well

There's no drawback, and there are only pluses. And just before I finish up, let's take a look at the plans

I have a few things to point out there. So, this should look familiar

When you're actually assembling this thing, what you want to do is you want to start with this piece, and this piece, and this piece

And you want to join them together into a kind of an H-shaped arrangement

That would be your first step. Then you're going to flip these things upside down, and you're going to put on the bottom

Now, the bottom can be glued in place, and I recommend that, because glue and screws are always better when you can use them

And there's no reason you'd want to make the bottom removable from the divider and the sides here

The top is a different matter. As I said, I put mine on without any glue

I haven't had a moment's trouble with it, but the lack of glue does allow me the option of replacing that top quite easily

Or just flipping it over, too. I mean, you flip it over, you're going to have a nice new surface, nice and smooth

So, that's something to consider as well. Do you remember I mentioned the carriage bolts for holding those clamps

The clamps are actually called hand screws, wooden hand screws. I really like them a lot

Here's the carriage bolt. Here's that coupler I was telling you about

And then a chunk of threaded rod completes the extension, and you can just barely see a bolt here and a bolt there on both sides of that divider

So, there you go. Oh, three-quarter inch thick plywood. I used Baltic birch plywood, which is a wonderful plywood

I've talked about this before in the course, but you can use just three-quarter inch good two sides plywood

That would work fine. That's a softwood plywood, but kind of refined surfaces, you know, good two sides

You can save a little money and get good one side plywood and put all the ugly unsanded faces inwards

You could even make this cart out of three-quarter inch thick sheathing grade plywood

So, that's roughish on both sides, but no matter. If you want to economize as much as possible, that's the thing to do

But either way, no matter what you make this thing out of, I think you're going to like it a lot