Sunday Play

With limited tools I managed to eek out a closed end pen in walnut. The cap and body do not match as they are two different blanks to make sure I had enough to part off of the body (my blanks are 5".) I consider this a prototype so I wasn't terribly concerned with that. The overall pen body is a bit long perhaps, but I consider it a success as the closed end was achieved.

Very Nice - Congratulations. I don't think anyone would ever notice that the top and bottom don't have a perfect grain match. Well done. - Dave

My brain is short circuiting, can post pictures on how it works?

KenB259 said:

My brain is short circuiting, can post pictures on how it works?

Click to expand...

I do have a couple of the process.

So we put a Jacobs chuck in the headstock with (a mandrel)and a turn by center adapter, then the bushing for the kit that corresponded with the (center end of the body) and then used the 60 degree to steady the body while turning. I don't have a pic, but you'll see it's pretty much the same set up for the cap, except for with the cap we installed the mandrel saver on the tail stock.

Here's a pic of the cap, the only difference here is the there is a mandrel and a mandrel saver, for the body we used the 60 degree. I say we here, because this whole Macgyvering scenario took two heads not one.



For sanding the set up is the Jacobs chuck goes into the headstock, a punch a bit smaller than the 27/64 tube went into the Jacobs chuck to make a mandrel, painters tape went onto the punch to help the barrel hold (like a jamb chuck.) We did have a small issue at the beginning trying to sand the body, when we first put the body on the punch it wanted to back off a bit due to the air trapped within the body and the punch, but we put tape to form a crude jamb chuck basically and it held for us to sand.

Hippie3180 said:

I do have a couple of the process.

So we put a Jacobs chuck in the headstock with and turn by center adapter, then the bushing for the kit that corresponded with the (center end of the body) and then used the 60 degree to steady the body while turning. I don't have a pic, but you'll see it's pretty much the same set up for the cap, except for with the cap we installed the mandrel saver on the tail stock.

Here's a pic of the cap, the only difference here is the mandrel saver, for the body we used the 60 degree. I say we here, because this whole Macgyvering scenario took two heads not one.



For sanding the set up is the Jacobs chuck goes into the headstock, a corresponding punch (27/64) went into the Jacobs chuck to make a mandrel, painters tape went onto the punch to help the barrel hold (like a jamb chuck.) We did have a small issue at the beginning trying to sand the body, when we first put the body on the punch it wanted to back off a bit due to the air trapped within the body and the punch, but we put tape to form a crude jamb chuck basically and it held for us to sand.

Click to expand...

I meant, can you show us how the pen works? Sorry for any confusion.

What a cool idea and finished product.

I agree with the fellas, I can't tell it's two different blanks.

Is your process based on the video Ed posted last week on how to make any kit pen closed ended?

derekdd said:

What a cool idea and finished product.

I agree with the fellas, I can't tell it's two different blanks.

Is your process based on the video Ed posted last week on how to make any kit pen closed ended?

Click to expand...

We didn't have the pen chuck Ed used, and we read itsvirgil's pdf..and then used what we had on hand to make it work. Just goes to show if you put some thought into thins you can use what you have.

KenB259 said:

I meant, can you show us how the pen works? Sorry for any confusion.

Click to expand...

Oh geez! So sorry for all the process explanation then.

The pen is actually a Manager Flountain much like this one only the end is closed. We could have closed the cap/clip end, but it wouldn't have had a clip. The end circled is the closed end on the walnut pen/instead of having the metal cap on the end of the barrel. Learning to turn closed ends is a step towards making kitless pens.

That makes sense now, I for the life of me thought that was a twist pen of some sort. Thanks for the picture and the pictures of the process were appreciated as well.