My First Color Casting and Soapstone pens

[65GTMustang]

I purchased a box full of Cactus from Joe a couple of weeks ago.
With the help of several good people here on IAP I have been learning how to cast my own blanks.
The two short pens are "Knight" Pens, the longer is a Clicker

Rods recent displays of his Soapstone pens inspired me to give it a try
One of the Knight Pens is turned from soapstone.

The two cactus blanks were cast with similar 41 and Mica powders - Although the picture does not show the deep dimensional figure from the coloring one is blackstar blue and the other is a Silver and grey.

As always please let me know what you think of the pens and castings?
I think they are decent to be my first attempt???

Thanks
Kevin

 

[thewishman]

Very nice, I like them all! Your casting looks good and that soapstone is really cool.

How was drilling the stone?

 

[shadetree_1]

I think you did a great job my friend !! Always nice to see my product turned into a thing of beauty !!
Thanks !!!!
Joe

 

[65GTMustang]

Thank you!
The Soapstone was a lot softer than I had thought it would be.
It drilled extremely easily - I did get a crack half way down and the barrel as a whole seems to have some seems / cracks showing - I think it is a weak piece of stone?
I bought it at Hobby Lobby so there is no telling how rough it had been handled?
I will try again tomorrow - it was a fun material to turn.

 

[MorganGrafixx]

Nice! The soapstone is the pinkish one I take it? I have been looking for something to go on these 3 Wall St. kits I have that are Rose Gold and Black. I think that pink/white will do nicely. One suggestion on the Cactus (i think...the ones with the black stretched spots), i wonder if you could get a blank with enough girth to cut it on an angle. That way, when you get down to the final thickness on the lathe, the spots will be even longer and will for a kind of spiral around the tube. Just a thought. Very nice work on them all though.

 

[65GTMustang]

Thats a great suggestion I have 3 other cactus blanks ready to turn - I will give that a try tomorrow.
Thanks

 

[bitshird]

Those are some real nice pens, I like the clicker, and the soapstone is pretty, I like the pink shades very nice start on soapstone, it's hard to find decent smaller pieces, they usually are handled pretty rough, and sculptors get the nice stuff, but you need a good size saw or a good wedge to get the great pieces.

 

[65GTMustang]

Ken - Do you have any suggestions on where to buy "good" soapstone?
I picked up this 4X3X6 brick at hobby lobby
Thanks
Kevin