First Pen Turning

Dan Mosley

Member
Messages
1,169
Location
Palm Springs, Ca
Well I tried out my hand at pen turning for the first time took a 1" blank of Mesquite- drilled it out - glued up - barrel cut it - put on mandrel - tightened up - turned and blew right into the brass sleeve.......................:eek:

Second attempt - put another one on and finished it out nicely - pictures show it on the mandrel during the finishing phase - which was 3 coats of CA glue - 0000 between each coat - then 4-5 coats of shellawax - took it off and used a padded clamp to put the kit together - it looked very very nice.......later i went back out to do another and saw that i had ruined the shaft end on the mandrel with my pointed live center - I thought I had just touched it to the end and was careful not to tighten it up but something went wrong......Dang.....:eek::eek::eek::eek:

This morning I ordered another shaft for the mandrel from woodturners catalog along with a 60' live center to prevent it from happening again.

The tool I used was a freshly sharpened up Bedan - skew tip on the ends for a quick touch - seemed to be the easy way to get a very clean consistent cut.


Well what the heck its all in fun I guess - if you would have asked me before I would have told you im never going to turn pens - now im having fun so I guess ill be turning more pens soon.............................
 

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Yeah I guess the pen finished would help........................
What I would note about the mesquite is that you have to use CA or some other type of filler because no matter how well you sand you will have open grain areas - my opinion of course but if you finish it without filling it just does not look as good as it could if you filled it - I know this from vessels and bowls I have turned out of the same wood - CA fills quick - you could used Lacquer but it will take you a bit longer to finish and you should let it cure - with the CA you can move along at a much quicker pace and the results are just fine on pens - on larger turning it would be to costly and I have found that Lacquer works best on the bigger stuff...............back to pens - this is quick fun .........still learning but now I have to wait (which I hate waiting on supplies to be shipped) until my replacement shaft and live center get here..................oh well........also i got a price break on Mylands friction polish so i thought I would try a small contanier of the stuff........I like shellawax but always game to try out something new..............
I ordered the better of the pen kits this time - slim line - I use woodturners catalog......I know pen state has the same stuff...........who else do you guys buy pen stuff from ??

thanks Dan
 

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Dan I buy from Woodturningz.com for the majority of my stuff. I don't know how it works, but they sell most everything that is in the Penn State Industry catalog cheaper than the price in the catalog. Then I buy a lot of my acrylics from Beartoothwoods, Ernie and his wife run it from their home and are super people to deal with . Nice pen by the way!!!!
 
You're off to a good start, learning some of the lessons most of the rest of us have learned somewhere along the way. ;)

I'd recommend against using the Myland's on pens. It's a nice finish for small ornamental pieces, but it doesn't hold up well on a pen that gets any real amount of use.
 
Not bad at all.

I think you will start putting more coats of CA on. I use medium CA and usually 10+ coats. If you get some micro mesh for finishing, you won't need anything over the CA. It goes up to 12000 grid. Than you can use plastic polish or something to make it even shinier. Still saying the free DVD from PSI on making pens is worth getting. Save a lot of time and headaches for a beginner.
 
I'd recommend against using the Myland's on pens. It's a nice finish for small ornamental pieces, but it doesn't hold up well on a pen that gets any real amount of use.

+1! Ca is a great finish to use Dan, some good Youtube stuff. WOP is good to. Sweet job for your first time out of the gate!
 
Thanks for the tips - I did use Medium thick CA but not up to the 10 coats but ill try next time when I get the mandrel setup this weekend - I have some micro mesh
Mylands - thanks for the advice ill use it on other projects
I did get the DVD that Kip and Rex did on Turning Pens its a huge help so you dont mess up first time out
The Vendor links - ill look at them and thanks for the links
First pen turned out nice - But, I no longer have it - the wife took it ......LOL
 
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