Lurker's first pics

[Grant Wilkinson]

These are my first pens - my first turnings actually.

The top pic is just dogwood waxed. I did it in a 3 hours seminar at Lee Valley.

The next one and the bottom one are acrylic. The second from the top is a fountain pen and the bottom is a cigar twist ball point.

The third one is a fountain pen done is bowling ball material.

I've just finished turning a green maple stablized blank. It sure looks different than the blank looked.

Any and all comments/critiques are welcome. I have thick skin.

[Dennis Peacock]

Very nice Grant!!!! I really like the one made from the bowling ball material. Very pretty.

Oh, and Welcome out of the "lurking" stages. ;)

[Keith Burns]

All look very nice Grant !! Ya done good.:) :)

[Grant Wilkinson]

Thanks for the praise. The bowling ball material is surprising. The blanks are round, like a dowel. The red one is solid red until you start turning it. Then, all kinds of patterns in black show up.
I imagine for the experienced among you, this can be said of pretty much any material.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Grant - great looking pens - would never know they weren't from someone with lots of turning experience! I like your use of different materials. Keep up the good work and looking forward to your next post!

[Ron Raymond]

Very nice pens, Grant. And nice selection of materials, too.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Grant they are all beauties. Nice job.

[Robert McGowen]

All very nice pens. The dogwood pen doesn't stand a chance sitting next to the other three though!
Welcome from the world of lurking.......

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Really nice pens Grant! I look forward to seeing photos of your future turnngs! Well done!

[Shane Whitlock]

Great looking pens Grant.

How is the bowling ball material to turn? There is a shop down the road that makes bowling balls and their dumpters are always full of rejected balls. I have been wanting to snag one and try turning a hollow form out of it.

[Jonathon Spafford]

Awesome pens! Look real nice! We love pix on this forum so now that you're done lurking, make sure we get lots of pix ;)

[Grant Wilkinson]

Robert: You're right about the dogwood. I sure does look plain next to the others. I've started a stabilized maple that was stablized in green, and it will put the dogwood to shame. It was a good first pen, though. I had never touched a lathe tool before that seminar, and dogwood was very forgiving. It needed to be against me and a skew.

Shane: The bowling ball is softer than the acrylics, but harder than the wood that I've turned. It is easy to keep it smooth. So far, I've only polished it with the same plastic polish that I used on the acrylic. The results aren't as good as with the acrylics, but it does have nice depth. The only down side that I found was that it tends to powder rather than peel. That could well be my inexperience talking, though. It was nice to start with a cylindrical blank. No bouncing off the corners.

Thanks to all those who served up the compliments. I'll keep them in mind when I next destroy a bowl blank.