First Pens

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Kirk Dietrich

Member
Joined
Sep 19, 2012
Messages
59
Location
Kenner, Louisiana
I guess this is the right forum, it reads Show Off Your Pens even though it is sub-titled "Let's see your best work!". I'm kind of embarrassed to put this pic under this forum but I didn't see another for first pens. These are my first three pens I did, I hope they get much better.

Kirk

The one on the bottom was my first, the middle my second and the top, my third. From bottom up, they are made from Pecan, Spalted Pecan and at the top, Sinker Cypress.
DSC_6293-1.jpg
 
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They look realy good for the first try. You can only go onward and upward from here. If you don't show them, the members can't tell you how to take the next step. Jim S
 
Hey Kirk, nice work! Nothing wrong with those pens - they look good! You are in the right forum. Keep up the good work. There is a Beginner Pen contest in February, so be thinking ahead.:wink:

Harry
 
Hilltop, nice of you to say, thanks. A friend gave me scraps of the sinker after siding a good portion of his house with it. The pecan is from my BBQ wood pile; earlier in the year when I found out what spalted pecan was, I raided my pile and cut some logs into planks and found the beauty.

Wiz, thanks. I used the sample WTF that the guy, is it Eric, from Exotic Pens sent me with my first pen kit order. I used five coats, probably could have used a few more.

Thanks Fire, I like the sinker the best so far too. Some parts of the spalted pecan just kept absorbing the finish, I think I should have sealed it with some thin CA first.

Thanks Seamus. Its fun for sure. Now, I've got to figure how to tie flies and turn pens at the same time!

Plantman thanks, no where to go from the bottom but up I guess. I certainly am open to criticism.

Thanks too Plano, a guy from Texas, Frank Schlicht, is the one that told me about checking the pecan in my wood pile. He's a fellow fly tier that I later learned is a wood turner too. I'm not very good at contests but if ya'll need participants, I may throw a pen in the mix.

Thanks again for the support.

Kirk
 
Those are some nice looking pens. No reason to be embarrassed about posting them. Many of us have some pretty bad first pens that don't compare to yours. Nice choice of woods and WTF is a great finish - much easier to apply than CA. Did you buff the blanks after a couple of days? I found that letting the WTF dry a couple days and finishing it off by buffing really brings out a nice glossy finish. Keep up the good work.
 
SMJ, appreciate it. No, I did not buff. I don't have a grinding wheel and or a buffing pad. Would an old cotton gym sock work? (clean of course).

Rizay, thanks. I'm feeling better about giving the pens to the guys that gave me the woods now.

Kirk
 
I doubt that an old gym sock will work - unless you can find a way to treat the sock with tripoli, another with white diamond and another with carnauba wax.

Buy Beall Wood Buff System at Woodcraft

3 Step Lathe Buffing System at Penn State Industries

I believe that many here have the Beall Wood Buff System listed in the first link. It is a bit more flexible (at the price of needing to change wheels) to be useful for larger items you might want to buff in the future.

Ed (exoticblanks) has a nice video showing his system. He doesn't use the third (wax) wheel. The wax does seem like overkill if you've already got 10 coats of WTF to provide protection.
 
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