Black is the New Black

[galoot_loves_tools]

A good friend has given me one of her husband's old urethane 'Hammer' bowling balls and the pens from that turned out pretty well. So, she called me recently and asked if I could make some pens from a ball that once belonged to her husband's (deceased) grandfather. I said, "Sure! No problem!"

Well, the ball turned out to be ebonite and after laboriously cutting some blanks, I tried to turn it. The stuff almost instantly dulled any lathe tool I put on it (not to mention the smell). Unbelievable. A friend I know at Gore told me those old rubber compositions for uses such as bowling balls were often filled with stuff like marble dust. So, I decided to try the old ebonite as an accent ring with some sort of black acrylic. This prototype is a chrome Sierra with a Woodcraft acrylic and a slice of ebonite segmented with aluminum (from a diskette shutter). Even that bit of bowling ball ebonite was a stubborn little nub on the end of the blank, turning-wise. Jeez.

 

[fernhills]

Tom,that is just beautiful.Way to hang in there when the turning gets tough.The black is perfect.[][]Carl

 

[rhahnfl]

Yeah... you did a great job with that one. That is very classy.

 

[oldelmer1]

Tom in Delaware,

Where are you located in Delaware, im originally from Newark, moved 11 miles away to North East Maryland.

By the way, NICE PEN!!!!!

 

[wjskip]

great save on the origional idea - It must have been a lot of fun cutting the blank if it killed your turning tools what did it ddo to your saw?
Certainly a pen you should be proud of.

 

[galoot_loves_tools]

Originally posted by fernhills

Tom,that is just beautiful.Way to hang in there when the turning gets tough.The black is perfect.[][]Carl

Thanks Carl. I appreciate the kind words.

The ball wouldn't fit into my bandsaw so I glued and wedged a dowel into the thumbhole and clamped the dowel into the end vise on my bench. I used handsaws to cut some chunks out and cut them into blanks on the bandsaw. Here's a shot of a Disston saw being used to cut out a wedge:

 

[R2]

Beautiful pen Tom!![] but I sometimes wonder about the effort being worth it!!

 

[doddman70]

Very nice I really like the pen!!! I tried to cut a ball once after fighting with hand saws for an hour my wife walked in and saw what I was doing and asked why I wasn't using the recip saw so I grumbled a little got the saw out had the ball quartered in about 10 seconds threw it in the corner and its still there after a year. I think its been long enough now that I could go get it and finish making blanks without her giving me a bad time[]

 

[bitshird]

Nice pen, so far no one has had any thing kind to say about turning Ebonite!! I guess I'll have to get an old ball and learn the hard way,[8] but I'll cheat, I'll use my metal lathe, not sure about the stink factor, or cutting it but after seeing the ring on yours and the green fountain pen that Lou did a while back, I gotta try [][][][]

 

[DozerMite]

That is very nice. I like the all black and chrome look.

 

[karlkuehn]

Extremely pretty pen!That is one classy Sierra, and great work on the segmenting. Never woulda thought to use the diskette alum. Lord knows I have enough of those things sitting around. heh

 

[VisExp]

Originally posted by doddman70

threw it in the corner and its still there after a year. I think its been long enough now

LOL. I didn't realize bowling ball blanks had to air dry for a year

Galoot

That is a very nice looking pen. You said in your post that you used aluminum from a diskette shutter. What is a diskette shutter? [:I]

 

[galoot_loves_tools]

Originally posted by VisExp


Galoot

That is a very nice looking pen. You said in your post that you used aluminum from a diskette shutter. What is a diskette shutter? [:I]

By diskette shutter I mean the sliding gizmo on a floppy disk, the part that has to move out of the way for the read/write heads to access the disk. I have a lot of old Sony diskettes and the shutters are pretty soft aluminum, easy to cut.

 

[galoot_loves_tools]

Originally posted by R2

Beautiful pen Tom!![] but I sometimes wonder about the effort being worth it!!

Me too, but I can always use the exercise and I did sorta promise to deliver some pens with the old bowling ball material. Now I have to gear up and make six more.

 

[louisbry]

After all that effort you came out with a really nice looking pen.

 

[Ligget]

Great looking pen![]

 

[VisExp]

Originally posted by galoot_loves_tools

Originally posted by VisExp


Galoot

That is a very nice looking pen. You said in your post that you used aluminum from a diskette shutter. What is a diskette shutter? [:I]

By diskette shutter I mean the sliding gizmo on a floppy disk, the part that has to move out of the way for the read/write heads to access the disk. I have a lot of old Sony diskettes and the shutters are pretty soft aluminum, easy to cut.

I thought that was what you meant, just wasn't sure. Thanks for answering my question.