PaulSF
Member
I'm about to try my first closed end pen, using a Baron kit and the appropriate mandrel from Arizona Silhouette. I'm going to just make the bottom part of the pen closed. They give very specific instructions as to how deep to drill the hole, which leads me to my issue.
With a normal pen, I cut the blank longer than the tube, drill all the way through, and use my barrel trimmer to make the ends flush with the tube ends. With the closed end, however, I can only trim one end, and I'm concerned that I will trim away some of the necessary depth. For example, I'm supposed to drill a hole that's 2.75 inches long, but the tube itself is only 2.125 inches long (I can't recall if those are the right numbers, but they illustrate the problem). When I do the barrel trimming, I'm probably going to make the hole less than 2.75 inches long.
How do I get around this? Do I go ahead and trim the blank, then redrill to get greater length?
Or do I drill to the desired length using a smaller diameter bit, drilling through the end of the originally drilled hole?
With a normal pen, I cut the blank longer than the tube, drill all the way through, and use my barrel trimmer to make the ends flush with the tube ends. With the closed end, however, I can only trim one end, and I'm concerned that I will trim away some of the necessary depth. For example, I'm supposed to drill a hole that's 2.75 inches long, but the tube itself is only 2.125 inches long (I can't recall if those are the right numbers, but they illustrate the problem). When I do the barrel trimming, I'm probably going to make the hole less than 2.75 inches long.
How do I get around this? Do I go ahead and trim the blank, then redrill to get greater length?
Or do I drill to the desired length using a smaller diameter bit, drilling through the end of the originally drilled hole?