Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda pen - AKA DUH!!!!

[rb765]

This woulda been my first pen made from some found olive wood. It coulda been a very nice pen that I had planned on giving my old boss for Christmas. But, I shoulda waited until I made that trip two blocks away from my house to the hobby store to get a new bottle of thin CA. Getting real close to the final size, then the dreaded shaking started...I stopped the lathe to find a 1/2" section of wood missing near the end of the blank. A little too big to recover from. And it was totally preventable because I had filled the small crack that had been there before with thick CA, but it didn't penetrate far enough to prevent catastrophe. Se La Vi.

 

[papaturner]

Tough break.........I`m sure it would have been nice.

 

[thewishman]

Glue it in anyway - sometimes the extra "character" makes an even nicer pen. I do it all the time.

 

[JayDevin]

Ruben
I have a good stash of California Olive wood....PM me with your addy and I will send you some...

Jay

 

[oldcaptainrusty]

Part it off to the brass tube and add a piece of ebony, it will look great and no one will be the wiser.:wink:

 

[rb765]

Pen

Thanks for the offer JayDevin. I work driving around town and come across great finds every once in a while. This was one, but I have 17 more blanks from that same crotch. The other side is already promised to someone. I picked the least intact one to try to turn as I wanted to save the more intact ones for the Lumberjocks Pentrade that should be coming my way soon.

And I hadn't thought of adding a piece...hum, might just work....and I have nothing to loose cuz I have to order new tubes anyways. Thanks for that idea oldcaptainrusty.

 

[nava1uni]

If you turn off the broken piece and add another you could insert a piece of pickguard in between and make it look like a part of the design. If you glue it back together once it has dried you can open the crack and do an inlay in the crack which would also look could. It adds character to the design. You can use either embossing material, ground stone, brass filings, copper filings, or even a wood
dust. Good luck

 

[rb765]

Wow, another great idea. The other side has a small void that is a little too large for CA but was small enough to hide under the clip. but now I can show it off. One quick question, is pick guard material any different from guitar pick material? I don't have any pick guard, but I have to take my son's clarinet in for service, so I can get colored picks while I'm there.

 

[ronhampton]

i think that pickguard is the material below the strings, to guard the guitar case.be sure to take the plastic protection covering off! damhikt ron

 

[rb765]

Thanks Ron. I guess I can get that at the music store too since they specialize in guitars for bands..and do the school instruments on the side.

 

[nava1uni]

you can order pickguard from Craft Supplies USA. To drill it I put it between two pieces of scrap wood.

 

[stevers]

Been there, done that.
Some I have glued back in, and some you just have to know when to cut your losses and move on.:frown:

 

[rb765]

Update

Well, I tried to part off the broken part and ended up just parting off the whole thing. I used a blank with less figure, but with good color and made a so-so pen. Nothing spectacular, but still nice because the wood had shades of dark brown, light brown, and a kinda pink. I guess I'll save the crazy stuff until I learn how to stabilize.

 

[PaulDoug]

Haven't we all been there, done that a few times? The fun part is figuring out if it can be repaired or some way of saving it. Some of them just are not meant to be..