Hints Wanted: Coffee and Cream Inlace Acrylester Blank

[penicillin]

I want to make a Coffee and Cream Inlace Acrylester pen for a family member who works in the coffee industry. I bought the blank and a Sculpted Arbor pen kit at my local Rockler. The Coffee and Cream blank is reportedly a very difficult blank to turn. The Sculpted Arbor pens look and feel beautiful, but they require a tenon to be cut square to the tube. The tenon sizing must be perfect, and the tube insides must be very clean for the mechanism to work smoothly. Still, I am up for a challenge. Lets see if we can make this pen happen.

So far, I cut the blank in half. The bandsaw cut the blank cleanly. Next, I drilled each half with a letter "O" Fisch pen drill (brad point). The drilling did not go well, with a lot of chip-out on both ends of each blank. I did not have this problem with the "Holographic Black" Inlace Acrylester blanks I have used. These Coffee and Cream blanks feel different. They feel very dry and crumbly, like an old Chips Ahoy cookie that sat in the open bag for months. (The Holographic Black blanks feel firm; more like a piece of cinder block.) Fortunately there is enough room to center the tubes between the chipped-out ends for gluing.

-> I would appreciate hints regarding this challenging Coffee and Cream pen blank and making a Sculpted Arbor pen from it. Here are some of my questions:

1. Should I try to seal and strengthen the inside holes with thin CA glue before epoxy'ing the tubes inside? If so, how would you apply the CA on the inside of the holes? With a Q-tip?
2. Should I paint the tube white before gluing it? Will a brass tube show through a Coffee and Cream blank?
3. Which glue do you recommend for the tubes? I plan to use epoxy, but I feel comfortable using polyurethane or flexible CA if they would work better. I use polyurethane on most of my pens, but this one feels special and I wonder whether epoxy would be a better choice.
4. Can I get away with grinding the ends with a standard pen mill?
5. Do you have any hints about turning it? (I plan to try my sharpest HSS tools first to see how they work on the blank, then try fresh carbide, but will resort to sandpaper if nothing else works.)
6. Do you have suggestions about how to cut the tenon down to the tube so that it is clean and square?
7. Can you offer any hints about the best way to finish it, assuming that I get that far?

8. -> What else can you suggest that will improve my chances for success with this pen?

 

[MRDucks2]

I have turned a few of these blanks, all seconds from the bins at Woodturningz which made some a bit more fragile. No to the pen mill if it is a "standard" mill. My first one I turned the pen mill caught a bean and ripped the side out of that piece of the blank. I would recommend either sanding square or a 6 fluted pen mill (no I don't remember where I got it). I glued the tubes with 5 minute epoxy and turned using a sharp skew and likely chasing the bevel on these. Use a light touch as the beans can catch and they are much softer than the resin, too aggressive and you will have to fill gouges in the beans (coffee grounds work). I sanded, finished with CA and polished when done. Use a light touch sanding, also, or you will sand away more bean than resin and have to really build up the finish to get it back in shape.