Berea Round Top European - Help Please

[RPM]

Edit 5/16 5:30pm Am I the only one that has ever done this kit?

Turned my first one of these today and will be assembling later in the week. In looking through the assembly, it appears pretty straight forward except how to do it and have the grain lined up when done. The instructions indicate to press the finial into the twist mechanism and then press the final into the upper tube. this seems to me to leave the grain alignment up to chance.

In looking at the parts it seems to me that it would make more sense to press the finial into the twist mechanism that is screwed onto the twist hold and sandwich the upper barrel. This would ensure proper alignment. Am I missing something here or is the way to do it?
Richard

 

[Old Griz]

To match the grain on that pen, I DO NOT put the mechanism holder in the lower barrel until the very last... Assemble the upper barrel and put the nib in the bottom barrel...then just put the mechanism in the bottom barrel slightly to it can be taken out again.. just press it in lightly.. put a refill in the bottom barrel and twist the bottom barrel onto the upper barrel.. you will see the refill point come out the nib.. untwist the lower barrel so the refill in completely retracted.. then wiggle the bottom barrel off the mechanism without twisting it, align the grain and push the bottom barrel onto the mechanism tight enough to unscrew it... then press it home on your pen press...
It sounds a whole lot more complicated telling it than it really is...

 

[RPM]

Thanks Tom,
Having stewed over this one for a while that is a perfect explaination and quite clear to me. That's another solution that I came up with sitting at my desk at work today unable to think about work and of course focused on pens. However, you added the partial insertion into the lower barrel where, I in thinking it through was going to do the full insertion after doing an off pen verification of the twist mechanism position. I had a few possible solutions and I needed a sanity check. I really like the look and feel of this kit and the fact that it uses the parker insert rather than the cross, but I think they could have done a little better on the design of the upper/lower barrel interface. Maybe something in the reverse of the berea cigar pen design (e.g. the finial capture is a spring loaded internal capture rather than a pressure fitting. Oh well, I thought I left the engineer at work, I'm in wood mode now.

Probably a bad choice for my first pen of this style, I used a piece of really beautiful lacey sheoak from Lee at Lee's Treeworks that he offered at a special IAP rate the other week. It would be a crime to assemble this one without the lace alignhed. Plus if it turns out as expected, it will be a college graduation gift for my niece (brag time - graduated summa cume laude, University of Richmond and #1 in the college of business).

Thanks again, I feel better now,
Richard