First Attempt at Closed End Pen

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Stick Rounder

Stick Rounder

Member
Joined
Feb 11, 2009
Messages
681
Location
San Antonio, Texas
Hello, this is my first attempt at a closed-end pen. The more I browse the pages here, the more I become inspired. I purchased the drill chuck and closed end mandrel two months ago but have not had the courage to attempt a pen. Then two days ago my aluminum arrived from www.speedymetals.com, they have everything and no minimum quantities. Then went out looking for drill bits, found them, not only do they cut metal, they cut granite, but that's tomorrow. I hope you like this, all comments are welcome, any specific pointers on how to attach a clip are also welcome. This is an aluminum closed end Cigar Pen. Much was learned.

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Thanks for looking.
 
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"a speeding bullet, and a hi-ho silver away!!!! sleek!
 
DougMPhoto said:
Doug...GREAT looking pen. What type aluminum did you use. How did you turn it?
Click to expand...

I used the 6061 grade metal, 3/4" aluminum rod from www.speedymetals.com those guys have to minimum and a wide selection. Though about doing the same in copper until I saw the price of 3/4" rod. Cut my blanks from the 12" rod center drilled with Relton 3/8" Groo-V Tip Multi-purpose bit. This bit is designed for hard metal, granite, tile and marble. No water or oil needed for drilling the blanks, just time. The closed end was drilled to 2-3/16" I would drill just a bit deep for the next one as I had some trouble seating the top side transmission holder. Glued in the 10mm cigar tubes, squared the ends and turned them one at a time on my shortend adjustable mandrel at 2630 rpm, Jet mini. Used a round nose scraper out of my Pinnacle starter set. Didn't really know how hard it was going to be so my one of two Robert Sorby tools ($) were not going to meet aluminum rod. I did try a little with carbide tip tool I bought for stone turning, really found no difference between the two. First time I had to wear a glove (left hand) with turning. The metal shavings were hot, probably next time with wear a long sleeve t-shirt as well. Dry sanded from 80-12k, finished with this two part metal clean and shine called Nuvite NuShine II. The only problem was seating the top side transmission holder pushing it the length of the tube, ended up removing the preassembled 8mm tube from the threaded finial/clip holder, pushing that down, then reattaching the tube. So three holders later, perfected that part, almost. What started out as a bright black kit quickly trippled and good thing, cause it still was not seated deep enough. Luckily there was an extra center silver ring band. Anyway, that's how I did it.
 
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