Ultimate Cam Clamp (Spring Loaded)

prusaprinters

This is a 3 piece spring loaded cam clamp. When you release the clamp it automatically pushes the cam away from your work piece. Its designed with the intent for jigs for mass production glue-ups. Mount it with 2 screws on the side which is slotted so you can adjust it as necessary. It prints with no supports and requires only a few common pieces of hardware:Qty 2: 5/16" x 1-3/8" compression spring (~0.032 wire gauge)Qty 1: 3/16" x 1" roll pin Jaw ProfilesI've included several different jaw profiles, but originally designed it for a jig to glue up wooden stars in one go. 45 deg Internal90 deg Internal135 deg Internal45 deg External90 deg External135 deg ExternalSpecial: 36 deg ExternalIf you need a custom shaped jaw, import the “Jaw - Flat” and then add onto the front of it. This could be something such as a semi circle to clamp onto curved surfaces.If you have inventor, the Jaw files are parameterized and you can easily change it to any angle you need.  PrintingI printed mine in PLA with 40% infill. On my machine it takes ~6 hours and 30m of filament per clamp.Print in the following orientation: Assembly InstructionsStep 1:  Print and gather hardwareStep 2: Slide spring over the insertStep 3: Slide the jaw into the front of the housingStep 4: Slide the spring into the jaw holesStep 5: Compress the jaws and push down. You may have to fiddle with them but they should snap into their dovetail groove pretty easily. The jaws now spring loaded.Step 6: Position the cam and push in the roll pin. You may need to first drill out the hole as its printed vertically and may be slightly misshapen. Distance LimiterThe cam is designed to travel 3/8". For a jig you may want to limit this so you can have less slop when inserting parts. There's four included 1/16th holes to limit the distance the cam can rotate. Just use any sort of finishing or brad nail: In ActionHere is a demo of it clamping a 36 degree joint. The thought is I will use 5 of these to glue up a wooden star in one go.