Sonoran Desert Woodturning

Pen Design and Construction - Part 2

2012-01-29T09:21:00.000-07:00

Well since there weren't any questions, I can proceed with the completion of these beautiful pens.

Here's a reminder of where we are going with this:

The finished pens

We left off with an array of pen bodies and grips with the brass tube glued in.

The next step is to mount the two pieces on the lathe and turn them down to size. My pen lathe is made by Sherline, which is actually a small metal turning lathe. I found it to be just right size for pen turning and it has the capability of doing making jigs and fixtures for pen making.

Blanks mounted on the lathe.

The pen parts are mounted on a long mandrel. Using a skew chisel, I first turn the wood into a cylinder and then form the taper on the grip. I sand down to 1000 grit and apply a sanding sealer which fills open pores in the wood and forms a base for the final finish.

Here are all the pens ready for the finish.

Pens turned, sanded and sealed

The finish I use is a water-clear lacquer that is specially formulated for musical instruments. It is resistant to hand oils and abrasion and because it is clear (that is, not yellow as most lacquers are) it allows the true color of the woods to shine through. My customers are very pleased with this finish. More than one customer has shown me a pen that is years old and looks good as new. I have even put one of my pens through the washer and the dryer (not intentionally!) and it came out good as new.

Finish has been applied

Three coats of lacquer is standard. If the sun is out, I put the pen outside to accelerate the cure. Did you know that it takes lacquer about 7 days to fully cure?

The last step is to assemble the pens. The parts are press-fit together in an arbor press. I perform a quick test to make sure the point extends the proper distance and the pens are complete and ready for you!

Pen Design and Construction - Part 1

2012-01-22T08:22:00.000-07:00

Welcome back to my blog!

People often ask how I make pens so I thought I would share my method with you. This will be in two parts because there's a lot of ground to cover.

The process begins with a design in mind. What I wanted was a design that would appeal to men. And since you can't read my mind, here's a photo of the finished product.

These pens take a Cross refill and feature a black colored wood grip, a holly (white) centerband, and mesquite burl body. I used Indian rosewood and African blackwood for the black grips. One unique feature of the pen is the wood body extends to the top of the pen and sort of hides the finial. This visually covers the finial, emphasizing the wood body.

First I choose the wood. I have quite a library of pen blanks. The mesquite burl blanks I have cut myself out the cutoffs from larger projects. Here's the parts for a single pen laid out.

From left to right: Holly, African blackwood, and mesquite burl blanks; two brass tubes that form the backbone of the pen; a clip, a transmission that extends and retracts the refill, the tip, and the refill. (Forgot to include the finial in this photo.)

To work!

The first thing I do is cut the top of the blank at a shallow angle on my table saw. Then I create a counterbore to receive the finial. A smaller drill bit is used to drill completely through the blank to receive the brass tube.

While you weren't looking, I counterbored and drilled all of the blanks and cut them to length. I also glued the holly centerband to the grips. I should have glued them to the body. More on that later.

The nest step is to glue the brass tube into the blanks as I have pictured above. The exposed tubes will telescope into the body.

Let's pause here while the glue sets up . Any questions?

And finally, the segmented pens!

2012-01-10T13:53:00.002-07:00

It's been awhile since I began my latest series of segmented pens. Whenever you start something new, there are always unforeseen problem to overcome. In this case it was to find a glue that would stick to aluminum and wood. Loctite came through with just what I needed.

And here a few examples of the outcome:

This is a rollerball pen I made from curly maple accented by scallops of red palm.

This is a twist body ballpoint pen I made from curly koa (rare!) and African blackwood. Even the finial is made from wood.

You can see the entire collection in my Etsy store. Check it out!

Mechnical Pencils

2012-01-06T12:58:00.001-07:00

While you are waiting to see the segmented pens I am working - you know the ones that required special glue for the aluminum - I thought I would post a photo of s batch of mechanical pencils I recently finished. These are without a doubt, the most demanding writing instruments I create. They require an incredible degree of precision to work correctly.

They use a Pentel mechanism. Long used amongst draftsman and engineers and known for their reliability.

In this group, are a number of colorful woods. From left to right: verawood, desert ironwood, purpleheart, cocobolo, desert ironwood, olive, tulipwood, bocote, and zebrawood. I think I have every continent represented here. Nope. Nothing from Australia.

If any of these interest you, contact me directly.

Back to work!

New Desert Ironwood Vessels Cont.

2012-01-05T07:46:00.001-07:00

Just wanted to share a family portrait of my new Desert Ironwood Lidded Vessels series. There are eleven in the series.

Desert Ironwood Box Series

2011-12-31T09:59:00.002-07:00

While waiting for the new glue to set on my segmented pen blanks, I decided to create a series of desert ironwood boxes. There are eleven boxes in the series. They are all basically the same theme, just different dimensions. I posted the largest on my Etsy store which you can see in the sidebar.

New Pen Designs

2011-12-24T09:05:00.003-07:00

In the new year, I will be coming out with some exciting new pen designs. I will be departing from Sonoran Desert woods to a large degree and embracing some of the exotic woods. I do this because my designs feature wood colors. I will be combining these wood in different inlaid patterns.

My first obstacle to overcome was how to effective glue aluminum to wood. I will be using aluminum to separate the various woods. In researching this problem I discovered that most pen makers use superglue, however I found this approach to be unsatisfactory. The pieces just didn't stick together well. In fact I ran across one pen maker who went to the extent of gluing side pieces on their pen blanks to keep them together while drilling.

Not the approach I wanted to take.

A call to Loctite led me to a urethane glue that does a much better job of gluing aluminum to wood. But it takes 24 hours to full cure.

So right now I am assembling a number of pen blanks in my chosen designs. Next will be the big test: Can they withstand the drilling operation?

That will be my next post. Stay tuned.

2010-01-05T09:16:00.002-07:00

The risks of woodturning. A faceshield is standard safety equipment for a woodturner. However I have a bad habit of not allowing sufficient time for superglue to set up before I turn on my lathe. Thus, my faceshield is spattered with glue spots that lower my visibility. Yesterday I was turning some lidded boxes. Since they were small, I decided the risk was low, so I was not wearing my face shield. All was well until I was parting off the lid, and without warning, the box flew out of the chuck, past my left ear. It all happened too fast to react. All I could do was stand there and reflect on what would have happened if it had hit my face.

The box was not damaged. I only made it a bit shorter because of the damage to the lid.

Today I'll be buying a new faceshield.

What Do I Do?

2010-01-03T08:25:00.002-07:00

I suppose I should introduce myself and what I do.

I am a woodturner, specializing in Sonoran Desert woods, like desert ironwood and mesquite. I produce bowls, writing instruments, kitchen and desk accessories and market them directly throughout Arizona and to the world.

I am a corporate refugee, having worked in the corporate world for 30 years. I retired in 2007 to pursue my passion for wood. In doing so, I have been privileged to meet people who share my passion.

I also enjoy camping. And the nice thing about living in Arizona is you can camp anytime of the year.

In the Beginning

2010-01-02T16:09:00.001-07:00

Last year (that's 2009) I was introduced to Twitter and Facebook as ways to promote my website. Before that, social networking was what my sons did when they should have been doing homework. But once I got up and running, I was amazed to see what happened. My social network has increased geometrically.

But neither of these tools satisfied my desire for a means to easily update my website with my current work.

So off into the world of blogging I go ...