Favorite Wood for Penturning

[JAB1]

1) What is your favorite wood for: a) low end pens like Slimlines b) higher end pens like Jr. Gents, Emperors, Jr. Emperors, etc....

2) What wood is your best selling pen made of?

 

[Russianwolf]

I don't have a favorite wood, but a favorite type. Rosewoods and Olivewoods. This includes African Blackwood, Cocobolo, Honduras Rosewood Burl, and other Rosewoods.

My best selling is Irish Bog Oak, thus the reason that I've made relationships in Ireland and the UK to obtain it in good quantities.

 

[NewLondon88]

I think my favorite to turn is olive, followed by the rosewoods.
I like cocobolo the best for most everything, but that is just my taste.

And if I can get furniture grade chechem, that looks phenomenal on a pen!
It has more chatoyance than anything else I've seen or turned. But 99.999%
of the chechem I see is boring.. wouldn't give it a second glance except to
kick it out of your way.
Someone who made furniture for Stickley gave me a 2 ft piece of chechem
and I cut some blanks at an angle.. beautiful stuff.

 

[rherrell]

Desert Ironwood followed by Olive and Cocobolo. I love LOOKING at Amboyna but don't like to turn it.

 

[nava1uni]

I really like Olive wood, Red Cedar, Redwood Burl and Maple. I like turning stoppers from Maple and Bocate. Bocate has beautiful patterns. But to be honest I just like wood, how it feels, smells and all of the patterns that show up as it is manipulated. No piece ever looks like another, even when it come from the same piece of lumber. Ain't Mother Nature grand?

 

[markgum]

I like the Olive wood; however, spalted wood makes beautiful pens. It is a suprise which way the spalt will travel and the diffferent designs you can see.

 

[jskeen]

Desert Ironwood, hands down. I've seen lots of high end burl and exotics, and granted, if I had the budget to pay somebody $20 a blank for ultra premium stuff, I might change my mind over time, but for all around wood that's relatively easy to get, not too expensive, wonderful to turn and finish, and looks great for either a high end fountain pen, or the bottom half of a wood and antler slimline, DIW is my choice.

 

[Mather323]

Desert Ironwood, Amboyna.

 

[OldWrangler]

I would have said Cocobolo but since I have gotten some cross-cut spalted Hackberry from Louis Bryant, that has got to be my favorite now. The colors range from greens to tans to dark browns with all the black lines in unique patterns. It turns easily, finishes good and sells.

I just ordered some more from him as he is running out. This is my 4th order in the last 2 months. Take a look at a typical pen from this wood and see what you think.....

 

[Rick_G]

For my slims etc. I like walnut, straight cut, cross cut and angle cut or spalted box elder. Both turn well and I have lots of both. Being local woods they seem to sell well, maybe people like wood they can identify with. High end kits where I live are Barons, Sedona's and others in that price range. Any more and they would sit in my display case for ever unless I used them myself so I don't really have a favorite there.

 

[dntrost]

Got to agree with George those Spalted hackberry blanks were awesome and I would love a dozen more of them...

 

[amosfella]

I would have to say Brazilian rosewood followed by the other rosewoods, thuya burl and ambonya.
Kind of hard getting Brazilian rosewood anymore.

 

[texasfootball21]

Pink Ivory for all pens is my favorite. Best seller isn't wood, its antler for me.

 

[djz9]

BOW not only makes a wonderful pen, and makes the studio smell great, but when I have enough turnings, I take the turnings and put them in a smoking box, put on a pork shoulder in the BBQ, cook it for 7 hrs, then smoke it with the BOW for 2 hrs and it is a great taste.

 

[NewLondon88]

BOW not only makes a wonderful pen, and makes the studio smell great, but when I have enough turnings, I take the turnings and put them in a smoking box, put on a pork shoulder in the BBQ, cook it for 7 hrs, then smoke it with the BOW for 2 hrs and it is a great taste.

ooo .. now that sounds good. For smell, olivewood is hard to beat. But I also
like the cedar, amboyna, cocobolo and kingwood. They smell great too.
I got some camphor laurel from an Australian trading partner that makes the
whole shop smell like Vicks. For wood aromas that one is the strongest by far.

 

[CSue]

I'm a few days late on this, but I love the smell and turning quality of a good piece of Canarywood. It's not as pungent as Olive wood. But it has quite a pleasantly sweet smell and turns nicely. I use it alot for slimlines, sierras and atlas.

Cocobolo and Olivewood are the best all round nice to turn and nice fragrance. They make a nice pen no matter what it is!