TTT? Trio of Tru-Stone Tycoons

[AlanZ]

Well, sort of a trio, but started out as a quartet.

These are my first Tru-Stones and first Tycoons.

I had to do some repair on the Black/Gold top and the Red/Gold bottom. The repairs are only visible under magnification and bright light, but I know they are there. So, instead of 4 pens, I am thinking three, by combining the R/G top with the B/G bottom.

The other two are Red Jasper and Banded Malachite.

I turned them with an Easy Rougher Ci1 carbide chisel (works great for Tru-Stone if you take it slow)

I have a flock of photos of these three/four pens if you click here. The original photos are sharper than the display of the uploaded photos.

 

[bubbatww]

They look great! Awesome job.

 

[Whaler]

Great looking pens, love the Tru-Stones.

 

[woodsofourlives]

You can't go wrong with tru stone, nice job

 

[AlanZ]

Woods...

Actually you can easily go wrong with Tru-Stone <vbg>

My black and gold pen turned quite differently than the red jasper.

The black is very hard and powdery... easy to blow it out if you're too aggressive. I found this out the hard way. About 1/4 of the cap end blew out while I was turning.

I had a couple of cut offs left over from drilling, and decided to try a repair. I turned away the blown out part down to the bare brass tube.

Then I drilled through two of the cut offs, sanded them carefully, and used CA glue to glue them to the tube and to each other (total three sections on the tube, with the last two sections being a total of 5/8" near the top of the pen). I put this all in a vise for drying. Then used a pen mill to square up the end.

It turned rather nicely, and after micromesh and buffing, it's REALLY hard to see where the repair is located... it's invisible until you know what you're looking for.

On the red/gold pen, I managed to press in the gold coupler bands of the bottom upside down (arrgh). Disassembling the pieces was a chore, and because the blanks are brittle, I got a small crack in each end during the disassembly. Fortunately, some CA glue and refinishing made these cracks almost disappear. As mentioned, this is the reason for the two colored pen... salvaged the perfect pieces from each pen and combined into one pen.

So, you're right... when all goes well, Tru-Stone makes a nice pen. For those without carbide tools, you spend quality time sharpening between cuts. And then if you're too aggressive, it's easy to ruin the blank. It takes practice and patience (and great tools) to get the most out of this material.

 

[jbostian]

Very nice set of pens.

Jamie

 

[Mark]

I love the Tru-Stone. Very nice Trio...

Someday I'd like to try it. I don't think my technique is there yet. Nor my tools.