Guess the material III

[MesquiteMan]

Time for another "guess the material" thread! This is a natural material cast in resin. This is obviously a Tapa Pacifica with a CA finish on the "material".

Comments on the pen are also welcome, good or bad. Thanks for playing and looking!

 

[Darley]

Is that the left over of your Tequila drink :biggrin: I mean sliced dry lime rind casting BTW nice Sierra

 

[jeff]

Hand plane shavings?

 

[Russianwolf]

Silly answer: a new material called "nocheat"
gross answer: kinda looks like fingernail clippings
Real answer: some kind of hollow vine.

 

[les-smith]

I'd know that stuff anywhere. I've made whistles with it for 30 years. It's acorn shells.

Nice looking pen, I like the combination of colors.

 

[bruce119]

Acorn shells. I don't think that's it but it gave me an idea.

Bruce
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[MesquiteMan]

Well that was easier than I thought it would be! I really did not think anyone would guess this quick! It is indeed acorn bases from a live oak in my back yard. Let me state this clearly, this was not my idea. Someone posted in the casting section about using acorns and it was suggested to possibly be able to use the base. I decided to give it a try and see how it came out. Pretty cool, I think!

I took the bases and dried them in my toaster oven for a couple hours at 200 degrees. Then I mixed up some water clear Alumilite with a little amber dye and poured the acorn bases into my mixing cup and mixed them in. I then poured it all into my mold and applied 80 psi pressure. I got zero voids and the casting came out great. The resin is quite clear with an amber tint. The inside of the blank is colored black.

Anyway, here is another pic with the raw material to give an idea what I started with.

 

[altaciii]

Curtis,
did you use any kind of ca finish to get shine, or is it just alumilite polished with micro mesh? The pen looks marvelous!

 

[MobilMan]

Wood shavings.

 

[MobilMan]

Delete

 

[toolcrazy]

Very, very cool idea.

 

[desertyellow]

Acorns never looked so good.

 

[JayDevin]

way cool~

 

[MesquiteMan]

I went back and looked in the casting forum and I need to give credit for the idea to Jeff Powell. He posted a question asking if anyone had tried casting acorns and that gave me the idea to try the caps.

 

[MesquiteMan]

Just for grins, here is one of the blanks before turing into a pen.

 

[mrburls]

acorn pen

Curtis, Awesome pen. Like the curls and color combination. The blank is so cool looking. You thinking of selling any of those? I'd be interested. Keith

 

[workinforwood]

When I first saw it, I was thinking carpathian walnut shells. I hadn't thought so much of the cap of an acorn, rather the entire thing cap and nut, but it does make more sense to just do the cap. It looks cool, especially in a pen. Great job Curtis! Now get down to the Outback or Texas Roadhouse and start scooping them peanut shells off the floor.

 

[Jim15]

Great looking pen.

 

[bruce119]

Mine was a complete guess only because I got a bag of acorns trying to figure what to do with. Darn spell check I would have beat les-smith if I didn't do a spell check but it was a tie.

Very cool Curtis turned out great now I know what I can do with that big bag of acorns. I'll get to it one of these days.

Very nice pen thanks for sharing.
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[wolftat]

Nice job Curtis, came out a lot better than when I tried it. Great looking pen.

 

[Mather323]

Great pen wow that is very nice!

 

[maxwell_smart007]

My first thought was pencil shavings...neat look!

Andrew

 

[markgum]

you are very creative. Nice looking pen

 

[NewLondon88]

Can we still guess?
OK, I'll guess acorns.

What do I win?

 

[sparhawk]

I was going to say calamari.

 

[bitshird]

Curtis, great idea and a real cool pen, you sure do have a great imagination, and some good skills.