Checked Olive Burl

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Sprung

Sprung

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Joined
Jul 1, 2014
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773
Location
NE WI
This piece of Olive Burl was perfect for something that I've been wanting to try for a while. I've been wanting to get a blank of some lighter colored burl that had checked while drying and was full of little checks. What I did from there was instead of glueing in the tube with clear CA like I normally do, I glued it in with black CA. This would partially fill some of the checks that were inside - and would ensure that when I got it turned down to size I wouldn't find checks filled with clear CA showing off the brass tube.

After turning almost to size, I filled in the checks with a few applications of black CA. After that I turned it down to size, sanded, and did my normal CA finish. The kit is a Gunmetal/Gunmetal Le Roi v. 2 from Smitty's.

I really really like how this pen turned out - it's probably one of my favorite pens I've made. I really like the effect of the black filling the checks on this piece of Olive Burl. Methinks I need to sometime get some more olive burl that was checked like this piece, especially since this pen will be on its way to a new home soon. I could have easily kept this pen for myself, but I made this pen specifically to give it to someone and am glad to be packaging it up and sending it on.

C&C welcome.
 

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Thank you, everyone!

magpens said:
I like that very much .... beautiful work !! I'd like to try that technique on some blanks I have. ... Where do you buy black CA, please ?
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Mal, This is the black CA I have. It says thick, but the viscosity/consistency is more along the lines of the Satellite City Super T (Medium) that I have and use. There are other brands too that offer a black CA.

I've got another pen in progress that I started on at the same time as this Olive Burl - a piece of Stabilized Chechen Burl - that I was suspicious had some internal checking. I haven't finished turning it down to size yet, but starting to turn it revealed the internal checking I suspected and I've been working on filling in the checks a little layer of CA at a time. Glad I used the black CA on that one too - will be a nice effect on that pen too.
 
robutacion said:
That is nice, very nice indeed.

I have found a few other uses for the amount of Olive wood I have like that, most from the root and burl. What you did with the black was smart and very efficient, congrats...!

Cheers
George
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Couldn't go and waste such a nice looking piece of wood! :biggrin:

Thought of this idea when I had a pen I turned down that had some internal checking that I didn't know about - no external signs on the blank. When I turned it down, I discovered there were a lot of hidden, internal checks. And the clear CA had filled them - and it was ugly looking. So I had the idea that I'd use the black CA on pieces I knew or suspected had internal checking - provided the black in the CA would contrast well with the wood in the blank.
 
Nice idea. I normally use epoxy to glue in my tubes but I know it can be coloured. I have a few burl blanks with some checking and haven't used them because of it.
Will have to give this a try. Oh a great looking pen.
 
That is a great looking pen, for sure. I used to buy a lot of mission olive from a guy in Fresno, Ca. who salvaged wood from sites where developers were clearing land. I would email Joey about a piece and he was very honest and said he never had a piece of olive that didn't love to crack! So I always knew that I would be filling with mixed epoxy, turquoise, or something. Never was able to keep one of the mission olive pens as they sold almost before they were done. Keep up the good work!!!:biggrin:
 
What is "Rubber Toughened?" We used to use a Loctite product "Black Max" for an industrial use, and it didn't dry as hard as regular CA. Is this like that?

-gary
 
vtgaryw said:
What is "Rubber Toughened?" We used to use a Loctite product "Black Max" for an industrial use, and it didn't dry as hard as regular CA. Is this like that?

-gary
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I'm not sure if they are similar products or not - this is the only black CA I've worked with and I bought it a while ago without doing much of any reading on black CA. My experience with this one, however, is that it does dry hard. Haven't done any sort of testing or trial to see if it hardens less than clear CA or not.
 
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