gordonfraser
Member
Hello all,
It's been a few months since I logged in - new house!
Before we made the transition I completed a pen that I was pretty over the moon with. I made it my goal to spend a lot of time over the smaller details, get the threads right and clean, get the barrel properly polished etc.
So I spent the good part of 2 full days worth of graft making my transparent fountain pen. I took 2 lengths of clear acrylic rod and painstakingly turned them to size, bored them out with 5 different diameters, threading each part with obsessive precision, making sure parts threading in to the next did so beautifully.
I fabricated a custom nib-holder from some Corian and created the branch part - that is, the join between cap and body, and also the part that screws off to refill. I managed to get all 3 different thread pitches on the branch part in the space of 15mm. It's not my best work by a long way but I'm really chuffed due to the fact that making clear acrylic flawless is incredibly tough, especially when you've been at it with a roughing gouge and skew, and 15 levels of abrasive, from 160 up to 12,000 grit.
I glued all the end parts together seamlessly, another achievement considering how easy it is to inadvertently get glue on clear parts ruining all that work. I thought, "that looks great, what a slog, I can't wait to get some ink in it and start using it."
Showed it with pride to Dad who went "Hmmm...It's a bit...underwhelming. It just looks like a tube. It looks like the cheap end of the spectrum really, not much going on...Sorry."
:bulgy-eyes:
hahaha.
Nevermind. It's like anything these days - handmade stuff might take so much more time, love and attention to detail, but it always loses to the stuff mass made. Anyway I wasn't too bothered as I was really proud of it and started using it the next day.
And I've been using it every day since. That's over 4 months worth of use, every day. And I've just refilled it last week. Which is pretty amazing I think. The reservoir compared to a converter is shown, so that's the reason, but I just love being able to see the ink sloshing about inside!
It's a great size too. Thin, perfectly long to fit in the saddle of my thumb/index and the section has a nice but not too exaggerated curve to it.
The pics of the pen in individual parts looking a bit scuffy are before I went at it with many more passes of Brasso and MM. It's now pretty much back to the stock transparency of...transparent! haha. Also where the ink viewer part is, the silicone grease has made a few bubbles, which look like messy parts. The threads and parts around them are flaw-less.
I also attached some photos of a Zebrano closed end eyedropper that I was so damned excited about until I totally hagged it by taking a parting skew to it and tearing it to pieces. It was a gorgeous finish on it as well - not too shiny, not too matte/unfinished. A nice warm glow. These things are sent to try us...
Comments welcome
It's been a few months since I logged in - new house!
Before we made the transition I completed a pen that I was pretty over the moon with. I made it my goal to spend a lot of time over the smaller details, get the threads right and clean, get the barrel properly polished etc.
So I spent the good part of 2 full days worth of graft making my transparent fountain pen. I took 2 lengths of clear acrylic rod and painstakingly turned them to size, bored them out with 5 different diameters, threading each part with obsessive precision, making sure parts threading in to the next did so beautifully.
I fabricated a custom nib-holder from some Corian and created the branch part - that is, the join between cap and body, and also the part that screws off to refill. I managed to get all 3 different thread pitches on the branch part in the space of 15mm. It's not my best work by a long way but I'm really chuffed due to the fact that making clear acrylic flawless is incredibly tough, especially when you've been at it with a roughing gouge and skew, and 15 levels of abrasive, from 160 up to 12,000 grit.
I glued all the end parts together seamlessly, another achievement considering how easy it is to inadvertently get glue on clear parts ruining all that work. I thought, "that looks great, what a slog, I can't wait to get some ink in it and start using it."
Showed it with pride to Dad who went "Hmmm...It's a bit...underwhelming. It just looks like a tube. It looks like the cheap end of the spectrum really, not much going on...Sorry."
:bulgy-eyes:
hahaha.
Nevermind. It's like anything these days - handmade stuff might take so much more time, love and attention to detail, but it always loses to the stuff mass made. Anyway I wasn't too bothered as I was really proud of it and started using it the next day.
And I've been using it every day since. That's over 4 months worth of use, every day. And I've just refilled it last week. Which is pretty amazing I think. The reservoir compared to a converter is shown, so that's the reason, but I just love being able to see the ink sloshing about inside!
It's a great size too. Thin, perfectly long to fit in the saddle of my thumb/index and the section has a nice but not too exaggerated curve to it.
The pics of the pen in individual parts looking a bit scuffy are before I went at it with many more passes of Brasso and MM. It's now pretty much back to the stock transparency of...transparent! haha. Also where the ink viewer part is, the silicone grease has made a few bubbles, which look like messy parts. The threads and parts around them are flaw-less.
I also attached some photos of a Zebrano closed end eyedropper that I was so damned excited about until I totally hagged it by taking a parting skew to it and tearing it to pieces. It was a gorgeous finish on it as well - not too shiny, not too matte/unfinished. A nice warm glow. These things are sent to try us...
Comments welcome
