CA Finish on pens question

[Christopher Hunter]

Hi everyone,
I love this forum----
quick question ---
can you use a CA finish on that acrylic stuff and antler and stuff that isn't wood or is it best used for wood????
I have never tried anything other than exotics for my pens and I've only turned about 30 of them so I'm not sure if I'm ready for that other stuff
---
thanks ,
Chris

[Michael Cody]

Hi everyone,
I love this forum----
quick question ---
can you use a CA finish on that acrylic stuff and antler and stuff that isn't wood or is it best used for wood????
I have never tried anything other than exotics for my pens and I've only turned about 30 of them so I'm not sure if I'm ready for that other stuff

Chris

You don't need to use anything except maybe some wax on acrylics -- they are plastic. I just sand to 12,000 micro mesh and polish with novus plastic polish.

[Bob Noles]

Chris,

CA is not a good idea on acrylics as that is putting plastic on plastic basically. Better to go with wet sanding and polish. I'm not sure about antler, but I do not think it would be my first choice there either.

Just a tip, if you think CA is a nice finish, try lacquer, it will blow you away.

[John Hart]

....
Just a tip, if you think CA is a nice finish, try lacquer, it will blow you away.

Yeah...try lacquer! Yule Love It! (hic):o

[Tom Stover]

On antler I sand to about 500 grit and slow the lathe down to about 500 RPM, or whatever the slowest speed is, then use thick CA to fill the pores, , sand again through 4000MM, use thin CA , and sand to 12000 MM.

[Guy Germaine]

I recently bought an acrylic pen blank just because I'd never turned one and wanted to "play". I turned it down to size, and then sanded it through 1000 grit (NOT MM). then, I was looking around the shop for some polish to play with. It found a can of Mother's Aluminum polish and thought, what the heck, I'm playing anyway. That stuff put a shine on that pen like you wouldn't believe. I just put a little on a paper towel, turn the lathe up as fast as it would go, and kept rubbing.

[Bob Noles]

Yeah...try lacquer! Yule Love It! (hic):o

John,

I thought you were trying to dry out :D

[Cary Falk]

Brasso works well to.

[Gary DeWitt]

On plastics, anything with a really fine grit works well, like auto rubbing and buffing compound, etc. The wax museums use, a microcrystaline wax, works well to prevent fingerprints.

On antler (bone, etc.) I'm wondering if just wax would do as well, let them get a "patina" after awhile.