To protect your endgrain from splintering, attach some scrap wood from the clamps and they will protect the boards for quite a while.
It’s common for the edge fibers to break away when you plane end grain, unless you back up the workpiece with scrap. My planing jig speeds the process along. I took a quick clamp and removed the pad at one end, then drilled a hole through the clamp head and bolted a scrap of wood to it. The scrap lasts a long time before it’s pared down by the plane. I hand-tighten the nut, so replacement is easy to do when the time comes.
