Slimline problem, upper barrel will not come off

[RyanNJ]

I turned a bamboo pen lastnight and I can not get the upper barrel off of the assembeled pen, any suggestions

 

[jfoh]

Stick it in the freezer for a few hours. Cold will shrink metal and get stuck things to come apart most of the time.

 

[Karin Voorhis]

now there is a new tip.

 

[Allenk]

It is, Karen, and a good one, too!
Ryan, do you use CA when you install the nib and clip ends? I do, and stuck one of mine. Since that one, I use a blast of air through the tube, after installing the nib, and down into the tube after installing the clip, and wait a minute or two after that to put it together.

 

[snyiper]

Any chance glue got in it? If so the freezer will help that as well.

 

[Sylvanite]

Stick it in the freezer for a few hours. Cold will shrink metal and get stuck things to come apart most of the time.

Just be careful with the blank. Cold will shrink many woods also, and some of them will split (one reason I rarely use Katalox anymore).

Regards,
Eric

 

[RyanNJ]

I do not glue the cap and nib

 

[Smitty37]

upper barrel tight

If the barrel was hard to install check the nipples toward the back of the twist mechanism...if they are a little too high you might need to grind them down a tad before installing the upper barrel...

 

[RyanNJ]

that sounds like the problem. i will look out for that next time

 

[Dustygoose]

Or maybe a little glue on the inside of the tube when the blank was glued up.

I'll remember the freezer tip, thanks

 

[mtgrizzly52]

One thing that custom rod builders do to remove reel seats from fly rods and I guess from the other types of fishing rods is to emerge the wooden reel seat in boiling water for a couple of minutes, remove and generally with some muscle pull the seat off the end of the blank. Now this is if epoxy is used to glue up the rod.

I've use this trick several times successfully, as well as doing the boiling h20 and then putting the reel seat in some ice for a couple of seconds. It will definitely slide off.

With CA, I'm not sure this trick will work as I alway use epoxy for my custom rod building en devours.

Rick (mtgrizzly52)

 

[JohnU]

If you epoxy the tubes in the holes, you might have gotten some inside the tube. I had that happen a few times and the barrel trimmer just spred it around enough that I missed it. Now I take the pointed end of scissors and scrape the ends of my tubes out before trimmimg.

 

[Allenk]

John, I've got a 1/4x20 piece of allthread that I use to clean the dried epoxy out of my pen blanks. I just look inside, and use the allthread in that end. Works really well.