Pen Turning Vendors Question and Finishing Pens

Dan Mosley

Member
Messages
1,169
Location
Palm Springs, Ca
Taking off from a comment from the other thread - I have bought from Woodturningz but like I had said I have not been to impressed by the ink cartridges that come with the slim lines etc -. I called the other day to ask about other kits for the future and the rep at Woodturningz said that alot of their products come from Penstate (they get a cheaper price thru bulk alot of times on the kits). In any case i know others who buy from Brea and I have not tried them yet.
My question is where others are buying their Kits from ??? I find alot of good quality kits are not cheap to buy

Other question is on what others are doing for finishes on their wood pens - I use BLO, Myliands, Shellawax, and CA Glue - I use them in different combinations and get fairly good results but thought I would see what others are doing for finishes ...................Thanks Dan
 
I stopped buying from PenState months ago. Their customer service is about the worst I've ever seen. I agree on their cartridges as well. They tend to skip. Unfortunately they seem to sell to many of the other pen kit sellers.

I buy some from Rockler and Woodcraft. The Rockler cartridges seem to be the best. I've bought a few from Berea and they were OK. More expensive though.

I use pretty much the same finishes as you do.
 
I've bought the Berea kits from Arizona Silhouette. I like the Berea kits, but I've not bought any directly from them. That's mostly because the first (and only) time I called them to ask a few newbie pen turning questions, the lady on the other end of the line was not only zero help, she seemed upset that I would dare ask her for suggested kits and bushings for a beginner. Arizona Silhouette has a good selection of pen blanks, and they seem to have a habit of throwing in a free blank or two with each of my orders. (Been a while since I bought anything from them, so I don't know if they still do this.) I did have one $10 to $15 kit that was missing a small part, and when I first inquired about it, they told me to just send a note with my next order and they'd send a replacement part (a thin trim ring, without which the kit wouldn't fit together). Next order, I did as I was told, but never got the ring. (As I recall I was told I'd need to purchase it, although it's been a few years now so I don't remember the details.) That kind of left a bad taste in my mouth about the company, but I figure they've given me enough free pen blanks over the years to make up for the wasted kit.

I've bought a fair number of the low to mid-level kits from Penn State, and they've been OK, but I knew I was not getting the best kits. I pretty much stayed away from Slimlines, although they have another one or two 7 mm kits that weren't bad. I also did a few of their higher-prices kits ($35 - $40), and the hardware was nice, but the drill bits they supplied were a shade too big, and the kit called for the wood on the barrels to be turned paper thin to fit. Because of the loose holes, I had to use epoxy to fill the gaps when gluing the tubes. On about half the blanks I ended up turning the wood down to exposed epoxy before I got it down to finished size.
 
I use hundreds of slimlines through woodturningz yearly. Seriously, between my own small pen business and my students, easily 5-600 pens a year, easily. My other go to guy is Ernie at BearToothWoods.com. He has an OUTSTANDING selection of acrylics/acralesters/etc.. Wonderful person, Ernie and his wife are top notch people and love dealing with them. When I ran into a problem with trannies then one batch of pens had bad ink cartridges, woodturningz with no problems and or questions replaced them no charge and no shipping charge. With the bad ink cartridges, had a couple of students buy from PSI and had the same problem so must come from the same batch, but I do not know this for certain. HUT is another one we use from time to time.
 
I seem to drift back to CSUSA after trying others. Good selection, great service and top quality kits. Buying large quantities might be a little cheaper from others but in the long run CS takes care of me. IMHO Penn State kits are very poor quality. They do have the largest and most unique selection however. AZ is good as long as you don't complain to them about anything.:eek: DAMHIK
 
CSUSA and Berea Hardwoods usually offer the best/most consistent service. Quality would have to go to both of them as well. I've had the same Honduran rosewood burl Berea Sierra in my scrubs for over 5 years...looks almost new. I had a question last year about a nib rom Berea so I called...I was transfered to Joe, one of the owners who chatted my ear off for 45 minutes like I was his neighbor. In March of last year, I ordered a bunch of Aero's from CSUSA. Ended up with a Euro somehow. I called and Amber said "Oops, just keep it, we'll send you your other Aero on the house." Doesn't get much better than that!
The only finish you mentioned worth using is CA. BLO is sometimes used in tandem with CA and from what I see...about 50/50 success rate. I have never tried it (I use straight CA with great results) but see all the *^%%^$%*& on IAP from those that do.
 
Last edited:
For a while I think Woodturningz was selling some of the cheaper slimline kits from Shenzhang (not sure of this spelling)(Chinese mfgr) and not the Diacom we were more used to getting... but he realized they weren't of the quality he wanted to represent his company and switched back... since he's a PSI re-seller, that may have been a product of PSI making the switch... I know I got several SL kits from Woodturningz that all of the refills were leaking and I had ink inside all of my bags and on the clips and nibs... I just switched out the refills, but went back to getting my slimlines from CSUSA. Over the last 10-12 years I've been turning I've bought from most of the suppliers.... PSI, CSUSA, AZ Silhouette (Bill not Barry - haven't gone there yet), Beartooth, WoodPenPro, WoodCraft, Rockler, Hut, Wood-n-Whimsies, Berea, WoodenPost, and I'm sure others I've missed... I'm thinking that most of the smaller suppliers are PSI re-sellers, Berea and CSUSA have their own line and some of the re-sellers also re-sell Berea.... I don't think CSUSA allows resellers. I've found that all of the sellers are pretty equal in customer service... some a little faster than others, their sales lines and shipping departments are probably the same person... PSI is a larger company and has a more extended sales operation... the orders go through more hands... being an ex-shipping manager, I understand their problems and know that it will take a day longer on most orders... my last order was for 3 dart kits using their lowest cost ground service... I had the order in 6 days.. with a weekend in the middle. I have no problems and have never had a problem with PSI's customer service or shipping times.

I generally stick to the larger companies when I buy, though I will some times buy from a re-seller.... My preference for pen kits generally runs to the CSUSA catalog. My all time favorite looking pen is the Baron from Berea, which I think you can only get from AZ Silhouette, but the price has tripled since the first time I bought the kit... I've about stopped doing pens as the cost recovery in my area is getting much harder... they're not big sellers at the markets I do.... Bowls and Peppermills do much better.

As for finishes, I recently had an opportunity to try the Shellawax finish... it's a nice soft finish... not so hard and shiny as the CA.... don't know how durable it is, but I liked the looks of it... the wood looked like wood and not a hard plasticy look like the CA...
 
Last edited:
Yeah im sure your right - I asked about the slimline pen kits - the guy at Woodturningz said they are from PSI and as a reseller they are able to pass on a better price then buying them direct from PSI - My experience with the slimline kits have been ok but the refills in them are cheap and I really do not like how they write - I actually have been giving them away as gifts - The guy at Woodturningz suggested I try the Saturn and he felt they had better refills in the kits - I have some now and think the same as I did with the slimlines - On a more recent order I decided to try the Mesa Click Pen Kit (cigar type) and bought some extra refills (Parker-gel) - These kits are really good quality in my opinion but of course you pay more for them - Even the ink type cartridge that comes with them is a much better quality and writes nice - I guess its the old saying "you get what you pay for" - I have not tried alot of kits, just the 3 mentioned so im sure there are possibly other vendors with better quality kits so ill have to try others if I make more slimlines.

As far as other products (drill bits, trimmers, collars etc-) and their service they are a very good vendor and the people there are very knowledgable about the pen turning process and will help you with any question you have - No complaints - I have not tried some of the companies mentioned but will in the future.

Finishing - CA is fine but I use shellawax also to avoid the plastic dip look - I like the look of the friction finish over just a CA finish alone - I have also used them in combination putting on the CA first and then knocking it down and putting the shellawax over top and it works great...... but others I know use it by itself with nice results - thanks Dan
 
Personally, I like the Parker type refills and the way they write over the Cross type anyway.... I had a desk set that was actual Cross pen set that was given to all the managers by an old boss as commemorative for their 25th anniversary in business.... it did not write all that well and I eventually kept the stand/holder but put the pens away and just used a cheap desk pen I picked up as a give away from a vendor or somewhere... it was a better pen to write with. And even though I have a dozen or more hand made fine quality pens I've collected over the years, my normal desk pen is a give away from my local bank... one of the best writing pens I've ever used... I think it's a gel-writer.
 
Top