Blue keyboard tiara

[wood-of-1kind]

This is a follow up on my "pieces of cherry" segment, a continuation in a series of segmented pens. Maple was dyed with anyline blue mixed in with acetone and stabilized for 24 hours. Got good colour penetration and this is another attempt of creating the look of a keyboard. It is a 'closed end' chrome Mont-Euro kit but I did not use the standard clip nor CB. Instead I turned an ivory CB and used it to seperate the two barrels. And thanks to Eagle's comment about Elton John not "playing on your typical black/white piano" key, I went completely over the top and included a blue sapphire tiara as a finial. Methinks that the 'old girl'(Elton) would approve of this pen but his comments don't count unlike yours.
-Peter-

 

[Ron Mc]

Peter,
I like the addition you added to the top of the pen. It looks like some of the dye bled from the dyeing of the keys onto the face of the pen.
At what point are you dying the keys? If I remember correctly the keys are paper. Can you dye the paper before you insert into the cuts?

 

[wood-of-1kind]

Ron, the keys are real maple veneer this time and are not dyed at all. Yes there is bleeding but it'sderived from the pen's body. It gives it a nice swirling effect almost 'windlike' if this makes sense. This is a prelude to more work that will allow me to 'nail' a better keyboard.

-Peter-

 

[mrcook4570]

Love that finial!

 

[Ron Mc]

I'm sorry Peter. I just read your post closer and noticed that the keys were maple. Sorry about that.[)]
I'll be watching for the next one! I understand the "wind like" affect and can see it.
Now...Don't you think Elton would prefer a feathery scarf to be include in the picture?[]

 

[wood-of-1kind]

Originally posted by Ron Mc
<br />Now...Don't you think Elton would prefer a feathery scarf to be include in the picture?[]

A feathery purple scarf and a blue tiara. Where has 'good taste' gone[?][)]

-Peter-

 

[Penmonkey]

Very interesting pen.[]

 

[gerryr]

Great looking finial.

 

[angboy]

That's a beautiful pen! I love the tiara! [][]

 

[ctEaglesc]

Two suggestions.
Dye the blank uncut and glue up the inlay separately.
Rout out a 3/8th's dado in layin the "keys" after they have been cut/filed/ sanded to fit.
Make sure the inlay is deep enough to go into the center of the blank
This will alleviate the the uneven "bleeding when you dye the blank/
To make the work safer glue some sacirificial stock around the blank to make it "worakable" cut it off after all tooling operations are done.