That didn’t go as planned…..

[InkyMike]

This is only my fourth pen, so I'm giving myself a little slack.

I have a songwriter friend I haven't seen in ages. She lost her son about a month back, and I'm finally going to get to catch up with her this week. She's been writing a lot lately so I figured I'd make her a pen in one of her favorite colors.

I picked up the blank at a local shop today - it was "synthetic burl" - it may have well been a bag of chips for all the chip outs I got with it - even with super light cuts and brand new carbide edges. One of the chips was so severe it exposed the brass tube a couple mm in what what supposed to be the bottom tube (at the top, where the chrome spacer goes between the top and bottom tube.) there was so much material missing that I wouldn't be able to use the spacer. Naturally they only had one of those blanks in stock, so I didn't have a backup.

I ended up making a spacer out of a piece of walnut blank. I used CA on the whole pen - the acrylic as well as the wood. It didn't cure as well as I hoped, I think I may have been a little heavy handed.

After a decent amount of sanding and sorting out the right depth for the transmission, I got it together.

It's not the most elegant but I think it works

Michael

 

[Gary Beasley]

For acrylic a negative rake is your friend. Were you using a gouge or a scraper? A flat scraper can be flipped upside down to get a negative rake of sorts and you may want to present it angled a bit as well. Better luck on your next try.

 

[InkyMike]

For acrylic a negative rake is your friend. Were you using a gouge or a scraper? A flat scraper can be flipped upside down to get a negative rake of sorts and you may want to present it angled a bit as well. Better luck on your next try.

I have a negative rake blade for my carbide "gouge" (the round one) but I was using a standard insert angled down a tad. I'm not sure exactly what type of acrylic it is - I've had better luck with other blanks.

 

[magpens]

You've done a good job in spite of the difficulties you faced !!

I say .. .. .. "Well done ! ! !"

 

[Alan Morrison]

Jumping from timber to synthetic for only your 4th pen takes a bit of doing, so congratulations for that.
Well done for finding a solution to fixing the damage.
I'm not sure why you could not have used the centre band. If you reduce both ends of the blanks by the same amount you can use the centre band as normal.
You don't need to use CA on synthetic pens, by the way.

 

[InkyMike]

Jumping from timber to synthetic for only your 4th pen takes a bit of doing, so congratulations for that.
Well done for finding a solution to fixing the damage.
I'm not sure why you could not have used the centre band. If you reduce both ends of the blanks by the same amount you can use the centre band as normal.
You don't need to use CA on synthetic pens, by the way.

Actually, I haven't turned a wood pen yet - my first four were acrylic (my first was Acrylester)

I didn't think the center band would work because there was so much material missing - basically a center bands worth on top
Of what was accounted for in the total length. It might have worked as you described but my fear was the transmission would have had to be inserted too short in order to make the refill fit.

I realize CA isn't need on the acrylic - but the spacer I made is glued to the bottom blank and I was hoping to keep the finish somewhat consistent - I probably could have just used CA on the walnut and sanded

Good lessons learned.

 

[howsitwork]

Good rescue for a fine cause. The wood might even improve the feel of the pen?

Id be tempted to try a fine HSS negative rake scraper next time. Although , if I get chipping I sometimes go back to my 1" roughing gouge , freshly sharpened and sometimes honed. It's mass stops it vibrating from the intermittent cut I have found and the slight curve helps shear through the chipped area.

As yet I've not gone carbide though

 

[InkyMike]

Good rescue for a fine cause. The wood might even improve the feel of the pen?

Id be tempted to try a fine HSS negative rake scraper next time. Although , if I get chipping I sometimes go back to my 1" roughing gouge , freshly sharpened and sometimes honed. It's mass stops it vibrating from the intermittent cut I have found and the slight curve helps shear through the chipped area.

As yet I've not gone carbide though

I think it has a good feel to it. I was just hoping to keep all the bits in chrome. I also sacrificed a tube from another kit to sleeve the walnut for the transmission.

It was sort of a harbinger when the barrel trimmer was also chipping a bit with a really light touch. I figured I'd be okay with a new carbide "gouge" but it wasn't to be. I did some initial cuts with a carbide scraper with rounded edges and ironically that didn't chip.

I'm happy with the outcome given the off the cuff solution.

 

[Woodchipper]

Good idea to "recover" the chipped end of the turning. I have tossed a bunch of acrylics that had a chip. Now I can keep them and add a piece of wood to finish the job. Great idea and nice pen.
To all: Would a Bedan tool used with the leading edge down be considered a negative rake? Edit: I think Gary answered this.

 

[tomtedesco]

Nothing wrong with finished product, you took advantage of a design modification.

 

[InkyMike]

Good idea to "recover" the chipped end of the turning. I have tossed a bunch of acrylics that had a chip. Now I can keep them and add a piece of wood to finish the job. Great idea and nice pen.
To all: Would a Bedan tool used with the leading edge down be considered a negative rake? Edit: I think Gary answered this.

Thank you. I ran through a bunch of ideas before landing on the wood - if I'd had another acrylic of a complimentary color, I might have used that - I considered stacking washers, and even running to the hardware store for a piece of steel or aluminum rod but that was going to take a lot of time and the wood was the easiest to work with - I had to have it done last night and I was competing with a potential power outage during a windstorm. As it was, the spacer I made was originally a little too long - once I assembled the pen, I discovered it was too long and the ballpoint wasn't protruding through the tip and I was running g out of room on the transmission to insert. So I used a fine tooth pull saw and gently cut it all the way around (at this point the spacer was glued to the bottom blank, and had a brass tube and the transmission inside of it - it was a miracle the edge ended up as straight as it did and that I didn't damage the transmission.)

Michael