Pen turning advice

[Ian James Webster]

Hi all,

I've turned plenty of bowls, platters and bottle stoppers but never tried Pens. With the holiday season fast approaching I thought I'd try making Pens as gifts. I've been looking at 'Starter Kits' from several of the on line retailers; prices and what's included seems to vary considerably.

Any suggestions for a good starter kit that includes everything I'll need (except the lathe:D) at a reasonable price?

THank you

Ian

[Donny Lawson]

www.pennstateind.com (http://www.pennstateind.com) www.woodturnerscatalog.com (http://www.woodturnerscatalog.com) These two are where I get my supplies at. Hope this helps.

[Ronald Fox]

Here is a book I found very helpful in learning to make pens:
http://www.amazon.com/Turning-Pens-Pencils-Kip-Christensen/dp/1861081006/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1317940236&sr=8-1

Also check if there are any woodcraft stores near by that have classes. You could attend a pen turning class, and that would be helpful too ;)

Ron

[Tom Hartranft]

Ref your question ... "Any suggestions for a good starter kit that includes everything I'll need."

A basic starter kit includes things like: barrel trimmer, pen mandrel, glue, polish, drill bit, pen blanks, and some number of pen kits. Other, more costly, starter kits include some small lathe chisels, and other nice-to-haves. You said you have a lathe and thus likely have all of the turning tools you'll need to get started pen turning: spindle gouge, parting tool, roughing gouge. So, you don't need a set of small turning tools. If you have wood and a means to cut to size and drill pen blanks, then you don't need pre-drilled pen blanks. Either a drill press or your lathe suffice for blank drilling. If you have a disc sander, you can make a simple jig to square up the tube / blank ends and thus you don't need a barrel trimmer. Some pen turners use their lathe to square their tube / pen blanks. Lastly, if you already have lathe-type wood finishes, then you don't need 'special' polish for pens. You might even mix up your own batch of shellac and wax ... kind of a shellawax home brew.

I have a disc sander and made a simple jig to square my tube / pen blanks. I have a variety of good wood, power saws to cut up and pen blanks to size, and a drill press for hole drilling. I have glue. Depending on the 'ifs' from above, you may only need a pen mandrel, drill bit, and pen kits. That's what I started with. I started with a type A pen mandrel kit from PSI which comes with five 7mm bushings and a 7 mm drill bit ... ~$18. I got 10 no-frills slimline pen kits to play around with on my learning curve, which are 7 mm dia ... ~$2.50 each. The packaged pen kits include all of the pen hardware needed to mount to your lathe-turned pen blanks; they also include the two tubes that you glue inside the drilled pen blanks. I also got some extra 7mm tubes and bushings for screw-ups during my learning curve ... ~$5. Total new pen turning investment ... $23 + cost of whatever pen kits you buy (e.g. in my case, add $25.50 = $2.50 ea x 10 kits). My mandrel fits in my #2 MT head stock and has adjustable length so I can tailor how much mandrel rod is whirling between head stock and 60 deg live center mounted in my tail stock. You will need a 60 deg live center to properly fit into and support the tail stock-end of your mandrel.

PS ... Penn State Industries offers a free ~45 min long DVD on getting started in pen turning ... easy no cost way to at least learn the terminology.


Tom

[Jim Burr]

I used the CSUSA kit a few hundred years ago. They have some great dvd's too. Until recently...I bought all my kits from them but I started using a Sierra from Berea and the Cigar from Woodturningz.