Hi from Northern Virginia!

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Triple Crown

Triple Crown

Member
Joined
Jan 18, 2012
Messages
122
Location
Alexandria, Virginia
My sons and I love making pens together. I am so glad I learned about this site! We wanted to do some snakeskin pens and it was through an internet search for snakeskin blanks that I eventually ended up seeing Curtis's Alumilite You Tube video. Immediately became interested in casting and even contacted Curtis and Alumilite with questions. It was really great talking with Curtis. And it was Carol from Alumilite that actually steered me to IAP (letting me know that I could get a 20% discount in February if I became a member). I have been consumed with IAP and all the pens and information since! Having a lot of fun doing the trivia contest, and the people sure are great! I'm about to post an entry in the Frankenpen contest but need to figure out the pictures stuff. I'm a newbie when it comes to forums so I have a lot to learn all around. Looking forward to continuing the learning and contributing what I can.
 
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Welcome from Springfield, Va. I just started casting in the past week myself and am having alot of fun with it. I have found this forum invaluable for info and answers. ;)
 
Welcome Greg, from far west Kentucky, to the addiction, sometimes referred to as the vortex. You mention that you have read some of the site, be sure to give the library a good bit of time. The link is at the top of the page. You will find an article called Library Index. This covers tutorials on about anything pen making you can think of. You will also notice that there are articles listed by year. Much good info there as well. When these fail to answer your questions, by all means post it here. I have never seen one go unanswered very long. You might also want to give this thread a good look. It has some very good info for the beginning pen turner; http://content.penturners.org/library/general_reference/Getting_started_in_pen_turning.pdf. Grab some wood, make some shavings and have fun all the while being safe.
Have a look at the series of videos ed4copies has just posted showing how to complete a pen from drill to finish.

Charles
 
Thanks everyone for the warm welcome greetings! To my fellow northern Virginians, I live in Alexandria - not too far from Springfield, Oakton, Mannassas, Stafford, ... Perhaps we could meet some day. Still waiting for my coffee to finish brewing. It's 22 degrees outside this morning and I need to wake up my son and get the car warmed up. Heading to a swim meet in Chantilly in a bit and then will get back online this afternoon - hopefully into the shop too! Thanks all! Greg
 
Triple Crown said:
Thanks everyone for the warm welcome greetings! To my fellow northern Virginians, I live in Alexandria - not too far from Springfield, Oakton, Mannassas, Stafford, ... Perhaps we could meet some day. Still waiting for my coffee to finish brewing. It's 22 degrees outside this morning and I need to wake up my son and get the car warmed up. Heading to a swim meet in Chantilly in a bit and then will get back online this afternoon - hopefully into the shop too! Thanks all! Greg
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Great! I used to live in Alexandria, close to the Landmark mall. Also lived in Southriding (basically Chantilly) for a few years as well. I would love to meet some more of you local penturners!
 
Perseverance!

Great! I used to live in Alexandria, close to the Landmark mall. Also lived in Southriding (basically Chantilly) for a few years as well. I would love to meet some more of you local penturners!
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Cool! That's close to where I live now. Looking forward to it. I'll PM you or you me. (I'm still new at this.)

By the way, how old are your boys?
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I've got two boys, 15 and 12. Went to the swim meet with my younger son today and he accomplished his goal of attaining that elusive 50 yard Breast Stroke qualifying cut off time for the upcoming championship meet! :biggrin: Got to spend time with my older son today too. We went to the Rec Center and worked out on the weight machines and then stopped off at Woodcraft to get some epoxy and CA. :)

Was hoping to do a new project with my younger son – he's been wanting to do the Artist's Pencil. Haven't done this one before. (Actually, all we've done so far are a lot of ball point pens – mostly cigars.) We got started though and persevered through a tough obstacle. The blank he chose way back specifically for his fat pencil is an acrylic called Confetti that we got at Woodcraft. The tube is 15/32" and quite a bit longer than the cigars. Even though we backed the bit out very often to clear the shavings, right after it pushed through, it got too hot and the shavings melted and bonded to the bit half way out! We worked slow and steady pulling it off. He held the onto chuck on the drill press so it wouldn't rotate and I pulled with a lot of might while wiggling the blank back and forth. He did not want to give up and cut it off or break it and start with another one. It took maybe close to an hour. I thought it would crack toward the end, but it held up. I told him that we might not get to do anything more tonight except paint the inside of the hole so the brass tube doesn't show. He didn't think that would be necessary so I cut a sliver of the remaining portion of the blank about the thickness that the plastic will be and showed it to him under light. Sure enough, it shines pretty bright through it. (Thanks all! Learned about reverse painting here.) Since I didn't have any Testors type of white paint, we sprayed the inside of the blank and also the brass tube with some white Krylon primer I had. Brrrrr it was cold out there. That's where we are up to on this new project. I'll post a picture of it when we finish it. Now my wife and I are going to watch a DVD. It's been nice being able to spend parts of my day with each person in my family. (Sometimes that time is better than all of us together! – not that that's bad!, it's just nice to have the one-to-one time.) Thanks for reading! Greg
 
I've got three daughters! The oldest is 6. She actually enjoys spending time in the shop every now and then, I get excited about that. Hopefully she will still enjoy it as she grows older...
 
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