I’m a hobbyist / maker. During making many fitted units using sheet goods I wanted a better way to secure the Festool guide rail to sheet goods including melamine, plywood, MDF and even sheets of acrylic. Some of these surfaces are slick and the guide rail can tend to slip, not good when you are cutting frameless cupboard doors perfectly square from sheets of MFMDF costing upwards of £150/$200. I wanted a quick easy way to clamp the guide rail while I made the cut without using traditional clamps that require access to the underside of the sheet and can often cause the rail to slip when you apply pressure.  I designed some vacuum clamping pods that connect to a vacuum pump (not a dust extractor / vacuum cleaner) and then just simply drop into the rail and use a ¼ turn of a valve to apply and release the pressure quickly. 

I’ve now used these for over a year on various project and they’ve gone through a few design iterations. After showing some woodworking friends they liked the idea encouraged me to make a few.

I’ve just made my first production run and have a limited number of sets available. During design and development, I took the decision that they should be built from high-quality components, so all the pneumatics connectors are Festo and they are engineered from POM engineering plastic which is durable but also forgiving enough not to damage the delicate surfaces.

I’ve attached a few pictures at the bottom of the post showing them in use. And I’ve also put a couple of YouTube videos online:




They are listed for sale on e-bay UK (with ebay international shipping enabled):

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/114077757491

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/114077879077 incl KD4-CK-6 connector suitable for VAC-SYS

Any questions just drop me a PM.

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Guide Rail Vacuum Clamp System (VCS-R) for Festool® guide rail tracks

What is it?

A high-quality accessory designed to firmly clamp your Festool guide rail to MDF*, Plywood, Laminate, Acrylic with the use of a vacuum pump. CNC machined from POM engineering plastic with push fit Festo pneumatic connectors.

Benefits

•   Improve safety. No more trying to hold down the rail while pushing the saw along!
•    Compatible with Festool® and similar guide rails
•   Quick ‘no tool required’ attachment and removal.
•   Speed up your workflow and save time.  No more fiddling with clamps.
•   Works without access to the underside of the material, ideal for breaking down sheets flat on the bench / floor.
•   Optional secure mounting for use even on vertical surfaces.
•   Unlike clamps it doesn’t shift the rail position when clamping force is applied.
•   Works with the TSO Guide Rail Square and Parallel Guide System. No rail slippage even on long cuts.

How do I use it?
Align the rail to your cut mark. Place a couple of VCS-R modules in the groove of the rail. Turn the valve a quarter turn. Make the cut. Afterwards, turn the valve quarter turn to release the vacuum pressure. Perfect cuts every time!

What else do I need?
You need a vacuum clamping pump such as the Festool VAC-SYS or another system such as VacuPress. We can supply a Festo KD4 connection at extra cost to connect to the Festool VAC-SYS pump. For other systems you will need an adaptor from 8mm O.D tubing to your system. You also need a Festool or similar guide rail.

*Due to the porous nature of MDF vacuum pressure may be reduced but in testing there was still enough suction down to 9mm MDF to hold a guide rail secure enough to make a cut.

Thanks for your support. Great idea! I'll look into what fittings are available for splitting the line to support both usages simultaneously.

I went through the eBay global shipping programme to take care of all the international stuff at this moment. Hopefully, in future there may be a free trade agreement between UK / US / Canada would be beneficial not only for you guys to get Festool stuff from the UK but also for my addiction to Incra and Jessem tools!

That's an interesting approach.    Good choice on using Delrin type material.

Have you used these in a vertical application?

Did you ever compare the VCS-R to the Festool Gecko option?

I'm looking into this Australian product:

https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/tools/hand-tools/clamps/59743-vacuum-clamp-systems

I've got a compressor, and if after clarifying with the vendor that all I need is the compressor, I'll try a double-sided system. If any one of you has used that system, single sided or double, please share your thoughts.

Edit: Just realized this is the same system as TinyShop's quoted vac-clamp.

@simonh  I think you need to edit the first sentence of your post above. Omit the second word?

PS. Your very rational and 100% correct IME review of the TSO parallel guide system gives me more confidence that your clamps are well though out and ready for work.

@simonh

You “don’t see why they should work”?

So, they won’t work with the LR32 sled?

I don't think these are being produced anymore. I'm fortunate to have a pair that I use with the LR-32 jig as I've posted in other threads. I recently picked these Rocker Vacuum Clamp Pods to play around with. After looking them over it dawned on me if someone were so inclined they could make an adapter to use them with their guide rail much the same as the VCS-R.



The black tabs that the T-bolts pass through are screwed into the back of the pods. The pods are thicker than the guide rails. It would be pretty straightforward to remove the black tabs and T-bolt securing fasteners from one side of the pod and fabricate an adapter to attach to the Festool or whatever brand guide rail.

@afish I'm using the Festool pump so I don't think I can answer your question about leaking.

What I can tell you is that curiously, Rockler went with an M10x1 thread for the ports. This has made it near impossible to source fittings. I'm converting the pods to use 6mm push connect so I can interchange them with the tubing I already use with the VCS-R.

They aren't big enough. I have some 1/4 npt. I found the M10x1 to 6mm PC fitting from Amazon with a possible 1-2 month ship time. I'm in no rush to use these they're just to play around with for some jigs I have in mind.

As to why Rockler did not use 1/8 npt, being a US company, is beyond me. It's like finding a metric bolt on my Harley. It's rare but it happens.

Correct the manual pumps would be no good on wood. You can pull vacuum through some woods.  You need a pump to keep up with the leaking.  However, I did buy a vacuum cup for helping move sheets around and early on in my vacuum clamping journey I took it apart and found that once the handle is removed 6mm pneumatic tubing will plug into the nipple in the cup so it can be pretty easily converted from manual to pump.  You would need to fabricate a mount for it but there are 6 threaded inserts molded into it so it shouldn't be to hard if thats the way you want to go.  The one below that I purchased is a little different than the ones pictured above so I cant guarantee it will be as easy.

Correct the manual pumps would be no good on wood. You can pull vacuum through some woods.  You need a pump to keep up with the leaking.  However, I did buy a vacuum cup for helping move sheets around and early on in my vacuum clamping journey I took it apart and found that once the handle is removed 6mm pneumatic tubing will plug into the nipple in the cup so it can be pretty easily converted from manual to pump.  You would need to fabricate a mount for it but there are 6 threaded inserts molded into it so it shouldn't be to hard if thats the way you want to go.  The one below that I purchased is a little different than the ones pictured above so I cant guarantee it will be as easy.

I have a lever actuated plate glass clamp.  I wonder if that could be converted too.

Darryl Keil has a number of plans for making vacuum press driven clamps in his books.  Bill Hylton has some as well.

Additionally, veneersupplies.com has materials and fittings for making 'pods' such as these. I have a few and they work well.

It seems like it wouldn't be a stretch for a company that makes 3d printed festool accessories to produce a correctly dimensioned adapter that could hook on to a guide rail and do what you're describing, @DynaGlide.

Quote from: afish on January 26, 2022, 12:13 PM

Correct the manual pumps would be no good on wood. You can pull vacuum through some woods.  You need a pump to keep up with the leaking.  However, I did buy a vacuum cup for helping move sheets around and early on in my vacuum clamping journey I took it apart and found that once the handle is removed 6mm pneumatic tubing will plug into the nipple in the cup so it can be pretty easily converted from manual to pump.  You would need to fabricate a mount for it but there are 6 threaded inserts molded into it so it shouldn't be to hard if thats the way you want to go.  The one below that I purchased is a little different than the ones pictured above so I cant guarantee it will be as easy.

I have a lever actuated plate glass clamp.  I wonder if that could be converted too.

Sorry, I was rushing around yesterday and couldnt elaborate.  The problem is the lever clamps work by pulliny the back of the cup to create suction.  If you look at the picks of the the ones like I posted there is a small dot on the inside of the cup.  This is a small port that works with the plunger button on the side of the handle and it actually evacuates or pulls air out of the cup.  So as you pump the plunger on the side of the handle it is drawing air out of the cup.  This is what a vacuum pump needs.  On the unit I posted the manual pump is all in the handle and it has a small plastic nipple on the bottom that just press into a rubber socket molded into the rubber cup portion. There are 6 screws that secure the handle to the cup. Once you unscrew those the handle just comes off and the where the little rubber socket that the handles plastic nipple used to go into is where you plug in the pneumatic tubing.  Its a snug fit.  I had thought about going that route but in the end it was just cheaper to make my own out of scraps.  There is literally nothing to making a vacuum pod. Its just a air tight substrate with some type of gasket and a air fitting of your choice.  You will need a pump and a pneumatic valve thats it.  The great thing about making your own vacuum pods it you can make them any size or shape you want.

If you want to see various vacuum uses, check out Woods website.  They make all sorts of hand activated vac setups for photo and the glass industry.  I've used their hand vac circular pads for 42 years as a glazier.  They make large systems for hauling glass up into the stratosphere for skyscrapers by crane and we have a wheeled unit with four hand activated cups that can be wheeled into place for 300+ lb units to set within a 10' height.  Their 8 and 10" hand units are the industry standard and the innovators all other companies copy.