Double Celtic Knot

[gketell]

Amboyna Burl on a Platinum Cigar kit from Berea (via Woodcraft) with aluminum (bottom of soda can) and more Amboyna Burl segmenting. CA finish.

I pushed my envelope and it is by far the best pen I have ever made.

And a close-up of the knot.

Actually getting a good photo of the highly reflective strips is tough!!

GK

 

[LostintheWoods]

That's really a beautiful pen----great job!

 

[tseger]

I can see how that would be hard to photograph, but from what I see, it looks GREAT! Good job!! Tim

 

[Tanner]

That's a beauty!!! Nice craftsmanship!!

 

[JimGo]

That's really pretty. The aluminum gives it a great accent, and is a nice compliment to the kit.

 

[mewell]

Great Job - Will/would you do a tutorial?

Mark

 

[gketell]

Thanks for all the nice comments!!

I haven't yet done a tutorial (since this was my first celtic knot pen) but I will try to do so on my next one.

I've had a request to tell how I did the CA finish. I'm just a newbie (this is only my second CA success) so getting it gloss smooth by putting the CA on "just right" is way out of my reach. Sand paper is my friend. I sanded the blank starting with 400 grit then switching to MicroMesh (MM) all the way through 12000. (Since I had widely varying densities I held the sandpaper across a different blank to act as a sanding board.)

At that point there was a little dust trapped in the pores and voids of the blank so I took a paper towel, added 3 drops of boiled linseed oil and pretended it was a friction polish: lathe on high and rubbed it in hard and kept rubbing it for 3-5 minutes. Now the wood was beeAutiful and all the dust looked like wood again.

Ok, lathe on slow, clean paper towel on the bottom and dribble a few drops of thin CA across the top until fully coated. Repeat. Switch to thick CA and repeat 3 times.

Now you have a pretty thick coat of CA that doesn't look all that great. Sandpaper is my friend. Starting with 1800 MM and working my way up to 12000 again I sanded that sucker into submission. Be careful to watch your sandpaper; always use a clean area of the sandpaper and then check it after you are done with that grit. If there is any color other than white you have gone through the CA back down to your wood... add more CA and start the sanding over again.

Once you get through 12000 without any penetrations I then rub on white jewelers rouge and buff with a wheel mounted in my drill. (I do it from the back side of the lathe as it is running so the speed of the lathe is added to the speed of the drill.) Then I change buffing wheels and do it again using renaissance wax once or twice.

That's it. Two times doing it this way and two times I got the finish I was looking for.
GK

 

[GaryMGg]

Greg,
That pen and its finish is outstanding. Superb piece of work.
Gary

 

[Ozzy]

Beautiful pen and an amazing finish; great job.

 

[Mudder]

Greg,

That is one impressive pen.

Truly something to be proud of!

 

[Alexander]

Beautiful job, thanks for sharing your CA method, we will wait patiently for the rest of your tutorial[]

 

[wudnhed]

WOW Greg, Awesome!!!!!!!!

 

[gerryr]

Beautiful work. The pictures are pretty dark so I took the liberty of copying the second picture and lightening it up a bit.

The fit and the finish are both first rate, the glue joints look perfect and the pattern is very attractive. Keep this one for yourself, don't sell it.

As far as producing a tutorial about how you did it, don't. I will not go into my full blown rant about that, but this kind of work doesn't require a tutorial, it requires experimentation. There are a very few things we do in penturning that really require a tutorial, setting up a pressure pot or powder coating are a couple, but things like glue-ups and wood centerbands do not. What's important is the journey, not the destination. Experiment and learn.

Now, I'll run for cover from the flames.

 

[byounghusband]

Greg,
Wow, I like your pen!! Great job thinking outside the box on this one and taking what has been done to another level with the addition of the aluminum in the celtic cross. I like the way one turner builds on another's ideas and creates wonderful items like this.

 

[bjackman]

Greg,
Very sharp looking pen. Your glue-up looks spot on and I really like how subtle the contrast is. Thanks for sharing.

If you don't mind, tell us a little about your process with cutting and the aluminum. What saw blade/thickness and was any work needed to get the aluminum from the bottom of the soda can flat?

Thanks

 

[gketell]

byounghusband, there is no doubt I learned from many on this site and others before I made this. A few specific acknowledgements:

Jay Fox, instructor at the Dublin, CA woodcraft store who taught the first/only class I have had on laminations.

ctEagle for showing what can be done with a tablesaw sled.

Sblake_l who posted a new sled design with changeable blocks for the differnt angles. VERY cool.

WoodKnots for the idea of making the Celtic knot in the first place.
Someone else I can't find who posted the rough outline for how to make them.

Alxe24 for the (indirect) solution to the problem of the knots changing lengths as you rotate and make the cuts (exactly match your saw kerf thickness with your filler) and for the idea of using the soda can for the highlight metal.

Thank you all. Without you and this site I would not have been able to do this.

Bjackman,
basically I was able to cut two pieces out of each soda bottom just using a set of metal sheers (I also used heavy duty shop scissors on one of them). (Soda can bottoms are only .0125 thick.) Once cut to size they were "close" to flat. I then hammered them with my dead-blow mallet on the flat of my vise. It got them "closer" to flat. They never did flatten perfectly but it was close enough that clamping and glue were able to hold it. By the way, I just used (lots of) medium HotStuff CA to glue everything up. Epoxy or Polyurethane glue would have been better but I'm not that patient.

GK

 

[gketell]

GerryR,

I definitely would not sell this pen. However, I created it expressly for a pen-swap so it is being shipped to a lucky sole in NV. I'll just have to make another one for me. []

GK

 

[NavyDiver]

Beautiful work. You sure your pen swap buddy isn't in VA Beach? [)] []

 

[johncrane]

very nice well done Greg[]

 

[thewishman]

Absolutely beautiful! Very nice work. Your pen looks very classy.

Chris

 

[johnnycnc]

Very nice work and execution
of the idea.[]
I like it.

 

[bgray]

What adhesive did you use to bond the aluminum to the wood?

Great pen!

 

[gketell]

Bgray,
Everything was done with CA. LOTS of CA.

GK

 

[gmcnut]

WOW! B-U-Tiful pen.

 

[pete00]

Originally posted by gketell
<br />GerryR,

I definitely would not sell this pen. However, I created it expressly for a pen-swap so it is being shipped to a lucky sole in NV. I'll just have to make another one for me. []

GK

SUPER JOB !!!!

as long as you have to make another one, i dont think anyone would mind if you posted the second one with some construction pictures.

[][}][][}][][}][][}]

 

[cozee]

Awesome pen! But I'd expect something like that from somebody named Greg!!!! I really like the double outline effect. Great job. I wasn't a fan of segmenting till I saw some really great work last Saturday at the MPG. I was also honored to receive a DBL Celtic knot pen from a fellow board member. After studying it for a few days I've decided to get my mitre saw set-up to do segmenting.

 

[chigdon]

Freakin awesome!

 

[gketell]

Thanks to all for the kind words!

cozee, if you use your miter saw just be careful; those segments are less than 1/8" thick (2xAluminum + Segment = saw kerf) and you may end up with parts a-flyin'. Hopefully not finger parts!

GK

 

[huntersilver]

very nice work!!

 

[skiprat]

I think that is the best Celtic Knot I've seen so far. The first time I saw it, the pic didn't do it justice. Now that it has been tweaked by Gerry you can really appreciate the workmanship. 10 out of 10 Greg

 

[gketell]

Thank you, Skiprat. That is high complement indeed coming from you!

Thanks to Gerry too for adjusting the picture so others could see it. (I guess I need to tweak my monitor some because my photos were a perfect match to the pen for me and Gerry's were washed out.)

GK