Two different cast pens

[Butlerwalt66]

The Classic is an attempt at an aggregate made with crushed off-cuts from other castings. The Presimo is supposed to be some swirls of two different dyed batches of West System....one white, one black. I'm pouring these into 3/4 pvc, and my swirling skills need a little help.
If anyone has advice about doing "aggregate" castings, I'd welcome your input. I just tried turning a blank filled with mica flakes, which was pretty disastrous. Thanks!

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[Charlie_W]

Wonderful pens Walter!! Your casting is spot on and the fit and finish is top notch!
Well done!

 

[mark james]

I'll agree, what I can see from the pictures the blanks are excellent and your turning is wonderful!

The top middle picture has a small bit of tube showing (try to back paint the tube black - not the blank), but I like the aggregate blanks, very nice.

Thank you for sharing.

 

[mikespenturningz]

Very nice!

 

[Butlerwalt66]

Thanks for the nice words- honestly, I was hoping for more translucence with the crushed resin aggregates- I guess mica powder makes thing sorta opaque pretty quickly.

These are pretty much my first attempts, and although I've looked through the library, I still don't know what y'all are adding to your compounds to make them so translucent and shimmery (If the answer is "less mica powder, you dimwit" please let me know. I'm using West System because I have a gallon of it in my cabinet shop (leftover from an exterior millwork project). But if there's something else out there, please let me know.