Aero pen problems. Help please.....

[Fitz]

I cut, drilled and glued up my first CSUSA Aero pen blanks today. Much to my surprise I don't have a barrel guide for my trimmer that fits the barrel correctly.

I don't have a disk sander. I went shopping for a disk sander and couldn't find anything locally other than a Craftsman belt/disco combination but the disk is only 9" in diameter. I would really like to have a 12" disk for use on segmented turning.

Any idea how I can trim the blanks and barrels? I tried the doublesided tape and sandpaper trick on the mandrel and couldn't seem to get it to work.

I am at a loss.

I found some "O" size interchangeable guides for the trim cutter. Would these be close enough? The Aero from CSUSA uses a 23/64" bit.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks.

 

[1080Wayne]

Fitz Take a standard slim or Euro tube , drill a hole for it in a piece of hard waste wood , glue it in , then turn to the ID of your Aero tube . This should then fit over the guide shaft on the trimmer . If you are only doing one or two of these , it may be simpler to sand it by putting 80 grit sandpaper on a flat surface , holding the blank vertically at the base and drawing it towards you , taking care to rotate it about a quarter turn between strokes . Cut to within about 1/32 inch of the tube end before doing this . Wayne

 

[Raymond]

What Wayne said. But here's what I wrote before I saw his post:

I'm a complete noob at this, so take this with that in mind. What *I* would do is to choose a trimmer guide that's as large or slightly larger than your mandrel (diameters). Cut a piece of 3/4" hardwood dowel about as long as the extended part of that guide. Drill it like a pen blank to fit the guide diameter. Put it on the lathe with suitable bushings (I'm assuming you have several sizes available to you *) and turn it down until it just fits into the Aero tube. Use that to take up the space and center the guide in the tube for trimming. Delrin, HDPE or something similar would probably make a more durable bushing than hardwood, but I'm assuming you want to do this immediately with readily available material.

That assumes the inside of the Aero tube is clean of glue since there won't be anything to scrape it clean in the trimming process.

* If you don't have suitable bushings, go to a hobby shop and buy some 12" lengths of K&S brass tubing. Get one piece that just fits over your mandrel, a larger one that just fits inside of the hole in the dowel, then get each increment in between those two (they come in increments of 1/32"). Cut about 2" (or just shorter than the dowel piece) off the end of each brass tube and telescope the short pieces together, gluing them with epoxy to make a single thick-walled tube. Find some washers that will (a) just fit over your mandrel, (b) have an OD that's larger than the hole you drilled in the dowel, and (c) has an OD that's slightly smaller than the inside of the Aero tube. The washers will work like the shoulder of a typical bushing. Slip a few washers on the mandrel, put the homemade bushing on the mandrel with the dowel over it, and finish with a few more washers before you screw on the nut. If you followed that, you now have a piece of dowel pinched between two stacks of washers which are pinched between the mandrel nut and taper. Inside, you have a bushing that should keep the mandrel more or less centered in the dowel while you turn it down.

 

[wizical]

if you have already the 7mm pilot shaft, you can buy from CSUSA the barrel trimmer adapters and cut it down to size on your lathe. Use the bushings that came with the aero and put them on the lathe with the barrel adapter, shape it and you are all set.

here is what you need to buy

http://www.woodturnerscatalog.com/s...immer_Adapter_Blank___barrel_trim_adapt?Args=

hope this helps, i used to use them with no problem, but i have a 9 inch disc sander,

 

[nava1uni]

You can buy some delrin rod. It is sold at Tap plastics and other supply places. You buy it by the inch. Then drill a 7mm hole in it and turn it to fit whatever size barrel trimmer you need. I have done this for all of the kits that I make when I the standard cutter rods don't fit properly. They work very well, it is similar material to the one sold by csusa. I get foot long rods in different sizes and also us it to makes bushings, spacers, etc. Nice because CA doesn't stick to it if it is being used on a mandrel during finishing.

 

[its_virgil]

One pen mill with a standard 7mm pilot shaft will be all you really need. You don't need all of the different size pilot shafts. Save that money for stuff you really need like kits and blanks. Make a shim for each different size tube. I made them as I needed them and now have a shim that fits most every kit. Some shim sizes will fit several different kits. I use the pen mill with the larger cutter head. I have found that gluing in a 7mm tube in each shim will prolong the shim's life.
Do a good turn daily!
Don

 

[Fitz]

Thanks for all the responses!

I have some spare 7mm tubes and I'll be making an adapter later today.

Thanks again!

 

[wdcav1952]

Fitz, if you are short on 7mm tubes, drill 1/4 inch hole in some corian and turn it to size as a sleeve.

 

[Fitz]

I managed to get to the shop this evening. I had a spare blank glued up with a 7mm tube in it. I used the Aero bushings and turned the blank to the right size. I used the "wooden" bushing on my 7mm guide shaft and squared up an Aero blank. Worked like a charm! I turned my first Aero and finished it. The fit came out nice.

Thanks for all the help!