For some reason, I tend to weld a lot of rectangles, and cubes, out of steel tubing. 99% of the time, it’s 1″ x 1″ x 1/8″ wall. For along time, I have been using these Wilton 90 degree corner clamps that I bought at Lowe’s, for something like $30 a piece. They are light weight cast aluminum, and have served me well. However, when welding a cube, it takes multiple set ups, several grinding set ups, and so forth. When a recent project arouse to weld some rectangles and cubes, I decided to invest in some new equipment.
In the first picture, you can see a rough set up using the mentioned Wilton clamps. The second picture being the end result.
I have been drooling over these clamps, from Stronghand Tool for years. But at $1600 for all 8 needed to weld a cube, they have been out of my price range.
I bought these corner clamps made by Stronghand Tools, to replace my Wilton corner clamps.
But I still need a way to clamp a third axis. After doing alot of googling, I found an image from an obscure website, showing how to use 2 products from Stonghand, to make a less expensive 3 way corner clamp. By using a combination of these pipe pliers and these clamps, I was able to make a cube in one set up! I actually ordered the parts from Welding Supply.com because their prices are less than Trick Tools, but I order some items from Trick Tools as well.
You can see a cube set up here:
| After tacking, before full welding. |
