Longleaf Pine cone pen

[Gary Beasley]

Start with cones from a longleaf pine. Make sure they are dry. They have pretty good sized cones with thick cores. There are a few other species that can be used, this one was very common in the south before they were nearly wiped out from over logging.

Then a belt sander to remove most of the leftover tab stumps.

Soak some thin CA into the ends once they are trimmed to useable length. Drill from the small end so you can center the bit accurately.

Prior to gluing the tubes in soak the inside with thin CA to reinforce the soft wood and ensure adhesion.

The wood is soft so turn with a sharp tool using a light touch

Makes a very unusual figured pen.

 

[Hippie3180]

Wow! I love how that came out.

 

[KMCloonan]

I have never seen an actual pine cone pen! Mostly we see pine cones cast in resin. Your pine cone pen is awesome. Thanks for the process photos too!

 

[Gary Beasley]

Just got this one done. The average longleaf pine cone blank is just big enough for a Wall Street style pen. If you look in the fourth picture above you can see the light colored structure in the blank that causes the flame figure seen here.

 

[GFHWoodWerks]

Very nice @Gary Beasley, that is gorgeous.

 

[JohnU]

These were fairly popular 12-15 years ago. It's nice to see they are still being made.

You did a nice job! I've always saturated the hole with the thinnest CA I could so it semi stabilizes the core. Then as you turn it, give it a thin layer of (now ultra thin) CA to help hold it all together. Their softness makes it easy to make them out of round so the CA helps.

 

[Gary Beasley]

These were fairly popular 12-15 years ago. It's nice to see they are still being made.

You did a nice job! I've always saturated the hole with the thinnest CA I could so it semi stabilizes the core. Then as you turn it, give it a thin layer of (now ultra thin) CA to help hold it all together. Their softness makes it easy to make them out of round so the CA helps.

I have tried the soaking before, it makes the surface quite hard to turn. The interior soak helps hold it together too. I havent had any problems with out of roundness.

 

[Gary Beasley]

This core must have been in the weather a year more than the brighter colored ones. It has what looks like spalting towards the end. Illustrates why you want the fresher cones to take home and dry in a protected place.

 

[GFHWoodWerks]

That's still a gorgeous key chain.

 

[Sataro]

Looks great to me!

 

[egnald]

Very Cool pens 'n stuff. I would have never thought about using a pine cone that wasn't a hybrid with alumilite. Great Job. - Dave