| February 25, 2025
In spite of everything I shall rise again: I will take up my pencil,
which I have forsaken in my great discouragement,
and I will go on with my drawing.
—Vincent Van Gogh
Oh, how that rings to me, to pick up my pencil and go on with my drawing (well, writing for me).
Recharged, enlivened!
I had watched some pen turning demos at a workshop before I even started my making journey and then turned one out of purpleheart the other month. It goes quickly, but there’s a lot of little steps, so I wanted to come back into the shop and work on getting my rhythm.
To get started, I didn’t have the supplies and there’s numerous places to order items, but I had heard about Penn State Industries and I figured they would have everything I needed in one fell swoop. I had followed a lead at our makerspace and noticed he had all the consumable supplies in his rolling cart. I was looking for pens, but inadvertently ordered Pencil Kits! Which was fine, because I’ve been missing having a mechanical pencil.
Making the pencils holds a lot of steps, of which I had started a few weeks back by cutting some cherry blanks. It doesn’t take much wood to make a lot of blanks, as a good starting point is a 7mm pen kit that uses a 3/4"x3/4"x5" blank. So, in short order, I had a dozen cherry wood blanks. While at the store, I also picked up a few tools and consumables, as itemized below:
7mm HSS Brad Point Drill Bit - I got this for drilling the centers ahead of time. We have them at the makerspace, but I’d like to prep some of the blanks at home while I have some spare time.
7mm Spare Tubes - I always order too much, lol, overthinking the process, and so I picked up this bag of spare tubes in case I would mess something up, or if I really got ahead in preparing blanks with the tubes glued into them. I do like the tubes from Penn State as they’re affordably priced and they’re already etched so they glue well into the blanks.
7mm Basic Barrel Trimmer: Steel Cutter - Another part of the blank preparation is, after glueing the tube into the blank, is trimming the ends until the tube shows a bit of shiny, indicating that the length matches the tube. This was another thing I got so I could prepare blanks at home. There’s a carbide option as well, but I don’t plan on turning too many, and I’m fine with sharpening, so I felt like this would work OK for me. It goes pretty fast and there’s not really that much wood being drilled, so I’m OK w/ the HSS version.
Pen Makers CA Super Glue - I already had some CA-glue, but it’s a little bit larger bottle. This one is smaller and so it neatly fits into my Dewalt carrying box, along w/ other turning supplies. My other CA glue was thicker, so this one is easier to work with the tubes.
CA Accelerator - To set the CA glue quickly, here’s some accelerator, a squirt bottle style. Has worked well so far. Small enough that I can fit in my Dewalt carrying box.
Shellawax - To get a quick shine, and also because I wanted to try some shellac-based products, I went ahead and got some Shellawax. It’s a small bottle (yes, in the Dewalt carrying box), and I only need a drop or two for each half of the blank. So, 6 or 8 drops is all you need for a pen! Shines well and is easy to use. Winner!
Not too much talk on the shapes turning or anything, I’ll cover that at a different point, now that I’ve picked my pencil up and returned to writing! These go pretty quick, so I’m pretty sure I’ll find time. I’m especially interested in the thicker pencil kit, as I can use it in the shop instead of just at the desk.
All for now!