Light Duty Stretcher Bars

Made to satisfy a tight budget...stylishly.

Light duty stretcher bars are great for those smaller paintings or giclee prints that will be framed or won't benefit from a thicker bar.

These are made of the same high quality, kiln dried fir wood of all the SBW bars. Like all our stretcher bars, they have a beaded (rounded) edge that holds the canvas and flat part of the bar slightly apart. The rounded edge greatly relieves the stress on the canvas and person framing. A tighter, more uniform stretch is the result of this feature because the canvas flows around the smooth (rather than sharp) edge.

For those who have had problems with cracked edges on giclee prints, you'll find the beaded edge will reduce or eliminate this problem. Think of it his way, if you're lowering a heavy box from a balcony with a line, you can let it down smoothly by running the line around a round handrail, but will find pating out the line around a square handrail to be quite jerky.

That's what happens with the squared edges on square -edged stretcher bars; the hard corners build tension and resistance and that's not a good thing when stretching. The idea is to stretch all the canvas, not just the edge where the pliers are pulling. We've seen instances where canvas has ripped due to the resistance.

We recommend use of our cross braces for strips over 30", to maintain frame strength.