Reviving the LaserLinez pen kits

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McKenzie Penworks

McKenzie Penworks

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Joined
Mar 11, 2012
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Fuquay Varina, NC
I posted in our vendor forum as well but since it's not terribly active and I'm super excited please pardon my enthusiasm about this but... Last week we purchased the rights to the kits designed by Constant Laubscher and sold at LaserLinez.

Our first production run starts next week and hopefully in a month or so we'll be ready to start selling them. I suspect we'll see a few things sell out but we WILL get to the point of having consistent inventory. Still made here in the US, still solid stainless, just a little more available :)

As a pen maker I absolutely love these kits and my only gripe was how hard they were to get. I'm very happy we're going to solve that problem!

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wohoooooooooooooo, I love those kits. I love making something that was all Stainless Steel!!!!!!!!!!
 
Great news. I hope it all goes well for you. I've always been curious if they're made in house or if a machine shop made them. No big deal just curious. I've made a few pens with the kits and I like them and they were well received by others.
 
Kenny Durrant said:
Great news. I hope it all goes well for you. I've always been curious if they're made in house or if a machine shop made them. No big deal just curious. I've made a few pens with the kits and I like them and they were well received by others.
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Constant designed them and he made them in house. He has quite the machine shop set up and pens were just a small part of all that he does. It was a big win having him agree to continue to manufacture them for us. He's also very happy not to have to bother with the finishing and selling lol
 
Repeating here my post in the Vendor Forums of an hour-or-so ago ( with thanks for your reply there, Tim !! ) ......

This is VERY good news !!! . . Thanks for this announcement !!! . . Congratulations and GOOD LUCK in this new venture !!!

I am sure that other IAPers will agree !!!
 
Thanks Tim. I can see it would be overwhelming trying to do it all yourself. From production to sells snd shipping. I really hope it works out for everyone involved.
 
Kenny Durrant said:
Thanks Tim. I can see it would be overwhelming trying to do it all yourself. From production to sells snd shipping. I really hope it works out for everyone involved.
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We're both very happy with our arrangement. Couldn't ask for a better machinist to be making them (he DID design them after all) and he gets to do the part he likes while we take care of the maybe less than fun stuff. Thankfully I've got employees to help! ;)
 
Hooray! I've been checking in on LazerLinez every couple months in hopes that they'd start stocking the kits again. Great to hear that I can start looking forward to something other than recurring disappointment.

I'm hoping we'll be seeing another announcement when they're hitting the site?
 
Bats said:
Hooray! I've been checking in on LazerLinez every couple months in hopes that they'd start stocking the kits again. Great to hear that I can start looking forward to something other than recurring disappointment.

I'm hoping we'll be seeing another announcement when they're hitting the site?
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Yep I'll be shouting it from the hilltops for sure. They will no longer be sold on his website, that will be the wood inlays only from now on and we'll have the kits on our website. Doing a redesign of our website in anticipation of the release as well.
 
excited for you and this new endeavor. Congrats and excited to see what new things you have in store for the future. I will sure be following closely!

Jon
 
McKenzie Penworks said:
We are set up with Schmidt so it's on the list of possibilities for sure. Putting my order in tomorrow for all Schmidt refills so folks don't have to swap them out after buying kits
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terrific news!

I put in my first order for a bunch of your blanks earlier in the week, can't wait to try them out!
 
If the quality of your blanks is any indication, these kits will be outstanding.
Love oilslick! When I give a pen made from this, my standard line is "Don't know your favorite color but it's in there somewhere."
Most recently was to my eye surgeon after cataract surgery. Along with a card that played the first 40 seconds of "I can see clearly now" when opened.
 
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Gregf said:
If the quality of your blanks is any indication, these kits will be outstanding.
Love oilslick! When I give a pen made from this, my standard line is "Don't know your favorite color but it's in there somewhere."
Most recently was to my eye surgeon after cataract surgery. Along with a card that played the first 40 seconds of "I can see clearly now" when opened.
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Much appreciated! I can't take any credit for how great these kits are but we definitely are excited to retain Constant as the manufacturer because he really does an outstanding job of both design and manufacturing. The kind of machinist that may slow things down to get a better finish rather than just try and crank them out as fast as possible, etc.
 
Wonderful. wonderful news. One of my customers is a group that works to bring companies here from overseas. They LOVE giving these pens to potential "movers" (the Raven is a favorite).
One thing - I've always preferred the stainless threads rather than the plastic ones - hope you can offer that.
Best luck and I'll be looking forward to seeing them offered.
 
Ted iin Michigan said:
Wonderful. wonderful news. One of my customers is a group that works to bring companies here from overseas. They LOVE giving these pens to potential "movers" (the Raven is a favorite).
One thing - I've always preferred the stainless threads rather than the plastic ones - hope you can offer that.
Best luck and I'll be looking forward to seeing them offered.
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Stainless threads are actually problematic... Metal on metal threads tend to feel "crunchy" or just not smooth. Also, they don't stay closed. The machined delrin insert provides a great quick closure that will stay closed in a pocket, bag, etc. I'd never trust a metal on metal pen in my pocket. I've got a titanium fountain pen here that drives me crazy because it doesn't stay closed and the seal is pretty bad so it dries out. It's funny, I've been approached by 4 people now that know of his early work with the metal threads and begged me to please make sure we don't have metal on metal threads. I realize we can't please everyone and in this case I firmly believe that using the delrin insert is the correct way to go about things so that the end user is happy with their pen. We'll have plenty of extra on hand in case they get damaged disassembling pens, etc for our makers.
 
Joebobber said:
That's great! They look like great kits. What will the price point be?
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We're going to keep the pricing the same as it has been for a while now... Basically between $19-38 depending on kit and roller/fountain/etc. I realize this is a bit more than the $9 Chinese kits and that the price point isn't for everyone but I firmly believe pen buyers will appreciate the quality and be willing to pay that extra $9-10. At least that was always my experience when I sold these as a pen maker. We're putting premium Schmidt refills in the kits as standard so you don't have to spend another $2 per pen to put good ink in them... and eventually the packaging will double as a pen box and save you another couple dollars there. I've got some cool ideas around the packaging that I'm hoping I can pull off without costing myself an arm and a leg :)
 
I too look forward to getting some more of these kits. I made a few over the years but as all had said it was tough to get if at all. Hopefully this will change now and wish you good luck with this venture.
 
jttheclockman said:
I too look forward to getting some more of these kits. I made a few over the years but as all had said it was tough to get if at all. Hopefully this will change now and wish you good luck with this venture.
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Let's say I have a strong financial motivation to ensure these are readily available. :) We went out on a limb a bit to make this happen but I REALLY want there to be a steady supply of US made kits and this was a lot easier than starting from scratch so I'm thrilled we could go this route.
 
McKenzie Penworks said:
I posted in our vendor forum as well but since it's not terribly active and I'm super excited please pardon my enthusiasm about this but... Last week we purchased the rights to the kits designed by Constant Laubscher and sold at LaserLinez.

Our first production run starts next week and hopefully in a month or so we'll be ready to start selling them. I suspect we'll see a few things sell out but we WILL get to the point of having consistent inventory. Still made here in the US, still solid stainless, just a little more available :)

As a pen maker I absolutely love these kits and my only gripe was how hard they were to get. I'm very happy we're going to solve that problem!

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I use these component sets almost exclusively will you be offering bulk discounts? I have been pretty inactive while I built my house but have almost blown through the last 50 sets I purchased from Constant..
 
mikespenturningz said:
I use these component sets almost exclusively will you be offering bulk discounts? I have been pretty inactive while I built my house but have almost blown through the last 50 sets I purchased from Constant..
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Hey Mike! Yep... we've got a plug in that will automatically do some mix and match bulk discounts on the pen kits. :) Obviously more purchased = deeper discount. Though we're a little tighter on the margins than some of the overseas stuff I'll do what I can.
 
McKenzie Penworks said:
Stainless threads are actually problematic... Metal on metal threads tend to feel "crunchy" or just not smooth. Also, they don't stay closed. The machined delrin insert provides a great quick closure that will stay closed in a pocket, bag, etc. I'd never trust a metal on metal pen in my pocket. I've got a titanium fountain pen here that drives me crazy because it doesn't stay closed and the seal is pretty bad so it dries out. It's funny, I've been approached by 4 people now that know of his early work with the metal threads and begged me to please make sure we don't have metal on metal threads. I realize we can't please everyone and in this case I firmly believe that using the delrin insert is the correct way to go about things so that the end user is happy with their pen. We'll have plenty of extra on hand in case they get damaged disassembling pens, etc for our makers.
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Yes but the plastic threads in to 50 component sets I purchased have been inconsistent and some of them are unusable. Actually I contacted Constant about this earlier this morning as I didn't realize he was selling this off. I just made a pen this morning that the threads are so tight I will have to disassemble it and take a different t front. If you have the inserts now I would love to purchase about a dozen so I can finish making what I have. I also may need to purchase a half a dozen clips as I was shorted these.
 
Also you need to make the back of the delrin insert larger you can easily push these out of the metal housing then you have to take it out and glue them in. If the first part was a few thousandths of in inch larger you would have to press that in giving a better situation..
 
mikespenturningz said:
Yes but the plastic threads in to 50 component sets I purchased have been inconsistent and some of them are unusable. Actually I contacted Constant about this earlier this morning as I didn't realize he was selling this off. I just made a pen this morning that the threads are so tight I will have to disassemble it and take a different t front. If you have the inserts now I would love to purchase about a dozen so I can finish making what I have. I also may need to purchase a half a dozen clips as I was shorted these.
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I believe he was out of the original clips. We've had to redesign around a new clip that is the one sourced component. (He'd purchased several thousands from a company in Taiwan I believe) Eventually I'll find a way to bring the clips back to the US as well but for now I have to make do with what we've got. Making new dies for bending, etc was outside of the scope of what I could do with the initial runs. It's a little crazy that our springs are made in Texas but the clip is the one part of the core kit that is sourced from asia.... In theory he can mill out this new clip to fit but we don't have that ability here in house so that would be something he'd have to agree to.

The inserts... I recall him mentioning he used to not make the threading deep enough. Resulted in some stiffness as it was basically trying to cut the threading when you opened and closed it. That's likely a black insert. We do have the newer white inserts here and they are very smooth on my tests. I'll send you a message and we can see what we can do.

We didn't buy his entire company... just the designs/names/etc so I have to balance a bit with things that may pop up from older kits. Going to do my absolute best to help folks but I can't guarantee every older kit will go together. What I CAN say is that we'll fully back any kit we sell under our name and will provide the same level of service we've been known for with our DiamondCast brand.
 
McKenzie Penworks said:
I believe he was out of the original clips. We've had to redesign around a new clip that is the one sourced component. (He'd purchased several thousands from a company in Taiwan I believe) Eventually I'll find a way to bring the clips back to the US as well but for now I have to make do with what we've got. Making new dies for bending, etc was outside of the scope of what I could do with the initial runs. It's a little crazy that our springs are made in Texas but the clip is the one part of the core kit that is sourced from asia.... In theory he can mill out this new clip to fit but we don't have that ability here in house so that would be something he'd have to agree to.

The inserts... I recall him mentioning he used to not make the threading deep enough. Resulted in some stiffness as it was basically trying to cut the threading when you opened and closed it. That's likely a black insert. We do have the newer white inserts here and they are very smooth on my tests. I'll send you a message and we can see what we can do.

We didn't buy his entire company... just the designs/names/etc so I have to balance a bit with things that may pop up from older kits. Going to do my absolute best to help folks but I can't guarantee every older kit will go together. What I CAN say is that we'll fully back any kit we sell under our name and will provide the same level of service we've been known for with our DiamondCast brand.
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This is why I said I would purchase them from you. I don't expect you to give them to me. Mine were the white ones. These inserts need to be consistent as I like to make sure when a pen is closed the grains line up on the pen when closed..
 
No offense taken :)

Grain alignment is always going to be tricky with triple start threads. You'll only get alignment in 1 of three possible options when putting the cap on. If it's the metal piece that's got threads that are too shallow we might be out of luck but... I'm going to see what I have laying around in the piles of parts. I'd pretty much decided to just start fresh with all new parts to be safe because he had WAY too many variations for my taste. Have to keep it simple and reproduceable! Oh and it needs to be right... every time.

Sent you a message so we can figure out what we can do!
 
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So... this may make it a bit easier to keep everyone updated.

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