Abalone pens

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ldb2000

ldb2000

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Laurence Harbor, NJ, USA.
These are a couple of Abalone pens I've made with my new shell saw . For the past few weeks I've been working on a saw that will allow me to cut shell strips to a very exact , repeatable size to cast for making pens . I've finally got it set up right and this is the result .
Paua Abalone Honu Pacifica . Thin strips of Paua Abalone cast in PR . The colors in these shells are awesome , they shimmer in the sunlight . The shell strips are set on the tube and then sealed to prevent air trapped under the shell strips from coming to the surface of the shell strips . Each blank takes a couple of hours to create but the look is well worth the time .





This one is Japanese Awabi Abalone on a chrome Sierra click . Awabi is an awesome shell , it's basicly similar to White Mother of Pearl except in the light it shimmers in purples and greens and golds and .... This is one of those imposible to photo shells so these pictures don't do this pen justice .








As always , comments welcome .
 
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Butch I have been waiting very patiently for you to post photos of this pen:biggrin: It is gorgeous I LOOOOVE IT!!!

Question: I live in Paua country and the shells are every were, I do not understand how you get strips from a shell that is curved to lay flat??? I DO NOT GET IT:confused:
 
Holy crap!! Those look awesome!! Better trademark, patent, watermark, serialize, stamp, imprint and guard that design with your life:biggrin::biggrin: (Sorry couldn't help it!)
 
Toni said:
Butch I have been waiting very patiently for you to post photos of this pen:biggrin: It is gorgeous I LOOOOVE IT!!!

Question: I live in Paua country and the shells are every were, I do not understand how you get strips from a shell that is curved to lay flat??? I DO NOT GET IT:confused:
Click to expand...

I cheat , I buy them in already flat sheets . They are very thin .015" and are about 3"X5" . From what I can see they take the shell and grind away the surface leaving only the Nacre (the colorful shiny part) . They take those thin veneers and bond the smaller pieces to make the sheets . I would think it is kinda labor intensive which explains the price of the sheets .
 
It's funny but the Awabi is actually the nicer of the two . I can't get the colors to show up in the photos but they really are awesome , they shimmer and shift through colors as you move the pen and look at it from different angles , kind of like the color shifting car paints .
 
Toni said:
Butch I have been waiting very patiently for you to post photos of this pen:biggrin: It is gorgeous I LOOOOVE IT!!!

Question: I live in Paua country and the shells are every were, I do not understand how you get strips from a shell that is curved to lay flat??? I DO NOT GET IT:confused:
Click to expand...
Toni, you know that butch is good at teasing our brains like that I had to Pm him to translate all that he wrote ot a newbie's language. heck i don't ahve a lot of hair left and he is already making me lose what I don't got on the top.
 
Freeking fantastic, now everyone would drive themselfs nuts trying to figure out how you cut them....me included:cool:.
 
Butch,
Wow. Those are some sweet lookers. I like 'em all. Who would have thunk shells in veneer strips. I got to get out more. Beautiful work as always.
 
Butch you wicked man, I knew that you were quite for awhile and knowing you, i thought you may have something up your sleeves. those pens are way hard for me to describe how nice they are. Once, I have looked at them and digested the language then I may make comments, but there are nothing to comment on since they are gorgeous. The first one awesome and the second one I already looked at it few times and can tell it's one of those thing that there is noway you can take a pic of it since the second you move then the light introduction to the pen blank will change.
OK, I have to take a deep breath buddy. I'll await till you translate the blank and the procedure to my newbie language, stop writing at pen turners guild level. LOL. I have to burn few cigars til I get to that point. :biggrin:
 
ldb2000 said:
I just hope you like your pen when it's done . I've run across a slight problem in the casting of the blank , nothing major but I need to work out a few things .
Click to expand...

Knowone is going to believe YOU are having slight problems!! If you do I am sure there are a number of people that would volunteer to help:biggrin:
 
Those are breath taking pens Sir!

Abralam??

Paua is gorgeous material for inlays and you have taken it to a new level of WOW.
 
WOW they do look I got a bunch of albone sitting in a corner somewhere that I was going to bust up and cast. I love the cutting. I can just imagine the tedious work that goes into it. After you cut and secured the strips to the tube did you cast them in resin and then turn them round. It almost looks like you did not it looks faceted but that could be an illusion of clear resin.

Nice job.
 
Speaking of Mother of Pearl , I've got several other shell pens in various stages of completion including a White Mother Pearl Emperor (would make a great wedding pen) and a couple of vintage Parker style pens with alternating Paua and MOP strips .
 
bruce119 said:
WOW they do look I got a bunch of albone sitting in a corner somewhere that I was going to bust up and cast. I love the cutting. I can just imagine the tedious work that goes into it. After you cut and secured the strips to the tube did you cast them in resin and then turn them round. It almost looks like you did not it looks faceted but that could be an illusion of clear resin.

Nice job.
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Yep they are cast in clear PR and turned . I sand each strip then apply the strips and sand the the tubes and seal with CA to eliminate the gaps under the edges of the strips because I was having problems with air bubbles leeching up from under the strips . After they are sealed they could just be polished and put on a kit but to make them fit the hardware I cast and turn them . They are very time consuming to make .
 
ldb2000 said:
Yep they are cast in clear PR and turned . I sand each strip then apply the strips and sand the the tubes and seal with CA to eliminate the gaps under the edges of the strips because I was having problems with air bubbles leeching up from under the strips . After they are sealed they could just be polished and put on a kit but to make them fit the hardware I cast and turn them . They are very time consuming to make .
Click to expand...
:confused::confused::confused:Butch, now you've done it. OK, if I were to hold the pen then the blanks are round or they have all those little edges of the strips? Man, you made it harder for me to stir at those pens some more. That tells you how green I am buddy. Help me out here.
First you blow my mind by the beauty of them then as soon as I start to enjoy them you made it hard for me to grasp it.
 
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The pens are cast in clear PR and turned round so you cant feel the edges of the strips . Since I finish the tubes to seal them before I cast them the edges of the shell strips are very smooth and could be put directly on a kit but you would feel the edges of the kit which is why I cast them , so they match the diameters of the kits . Due to the thickness of the shell strips and the CA coating over them the finished tubes before casting are about .010" , or less depending on the kit used , smaller then the kit parts so that means that the PR resin is very thin over the shells which makes it look like there is nothing covering them , clear PR that thin is very transparent and almost disappears .
 
As amazing as these pens look, I am even more impressed by the creativity of the mind that envisioned them in the first place. Every time I see something like this I am simultaneously depressed that my work can't compare, and excited that perhaps one day it will get close.

Super job; keep them coming!
 
Spats139 said:
As amazing as these pens look, I am even more impressed by the creativity of the mind that envisioned them in the first place. Every time I see something like this I am simultaneously depressed that my work can't compare, and excited that perhaps one day it will get close.

Super job; keep them coming!
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Thank you for the compliment .
The main thing to remember is to never let your mind be chained down by the thought "I can't" .
 
Wonderful work Butch. I can see the colors best in the reflection under the pen. Both are great but I think I like the colors in the second pen best. I'd love to see a picture of the Emporer pen when you finish it.

Keith "mrburls"
 
ldb2000 said:
The pens are cast in clear PR and turned round so you cant feel the edges of the strips . Since I finish the tubes to seal them before I cast them the edges of the shell strips are very smooth and could be put directly on a kit but you would feel the edges of the kit which is why I cast them , so they match the diameters of the kits . Due to the thickness of the shell strips and the CA coating over them the finished tubes before casting are about .010" , or less depending on the kit used , smaller then the kit parts so that means that the PR resin is very thin over the shells which makes it look like there is nothing covering them , clear PR that thin is very transparent and almost disappears .
Click to expand...

Also Butch in addition to helping the fit. I would think the resin would help the look and give it protection also. Resin acts like a magnifying glass almost always improving the way an object looks.
 
Very beautiful! Excellent execution. "new shell saw" is this a wet saw? Must be be very hard to keep from cracking?

Stevo
 
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Excellent Craftsmanship Butch

I'm wondering what one would look like if you used the PW and cut indexed facets in line with the strips... maybe too much, but I cant help but think it might add a prism effect since it magifies.

By the way, I'm up in your neck of the woods today.
 
Very very nice Butch! ive been doing some custom Abalone shell work also,the effort put in is well worth the outcome as your pens show it's real beauty, the only thing i don't like is the dust, a mask is a must when cutting these shells
 
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