Spalted Cypress

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rd_ab_penman

Member
Joined
Jun 1, 2007
Messages
1,645
Location
Red Deer, Alberta, Canada.
Dressed up in a Vertex Click with gold plated components.
Sanded to 400x, buffed with extra fine steel wool, applied 8 coats of Med CA, buffed with extra fine steel wool and polished with Huts Ultra Gloss.

Apparently as discussed on some of the pen turning sites, there has been issues with the click button breaking off of the plastic click mechanism threads if the pen has been dropped.

I Inserted a round wood toothpick inside of the hollow plastic plunger section of the click mechanism to help reinforce the threads.
IMHO, if the plastic click mechanism plunger was made for solid plastic there wouldn't be an issue.

Les

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robutacion

Member
Joined
Aug 6, 2009
Messages
6,514
Location
Australia - SA Adelaide Hills
Now, that and intriguing piece of Cypress...!

I don't think that I have seen spalted Cypress before and I didn't think that Cypress would spalt, I have a few large logs that were giving to me by the old fellow from the local timber mill, according to him, those Cypress tree were cut locally by himself, in the 1960's (that plantation long gone), he kept some logs unprocessed for later and they endup being buried when the back area of the mill was extended, many years ago but recently, he decided to subdivide the area of the timber mill, before he retired and his older son took over.

Was when they were working on the subdivisions that they duged out these 4 logs (1' 1/2 round x 12" long), and he offered then to me as he knows that I'm always looking for any sort of wood as I purchased some from him before so, this lot cost me only the time to use his truck to get them into my storage paddock, a carton of beer was only he requested...!

Anyway, I processed a few pieces from those logs, about 2" all around the logs, the wood is rotten, pass that you would think the tree was cut yesterday, the wood and the oils/sap smell are as strong as they were 50 years ago, absolutely amazing tight growth rings and colours but, no sign of spalting or any indication that it would ever spalt, the wood went from solid/fresh to almost powder, maintaining all its colours, no stains no nothing.

This is infact, what I would expect from the Australian Cypress wood (old growth) so, I'm perfectly aware that yours is not from Australia and that, there are a few different species of Cypress, this is the reason why I'm surprised that your Cypress spalted, I never seen that before as I said however, this doesn't mean that, in other countries Cypress can spalt, the effect is quite pretty...!

Cheers
George
 

hard hat

Member
Joined
Mar 25, 2012
Messages
470
Location
Norfolk, VA
good work! that's a dang good idea to reinforce the hollow click mechanism. I've lost several vertex pens due to breakages, now I'll maybe make the rest of them.
 
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