Determining appropriate pen thickness...

[Aaron Buys]

I'm just about ready to start the sanding process on my first pen and its still a bit thick and not yet at the 1/64th of an inch larger than the bushings as directed on my pen kit. Do you penmakers just "eyeball" the diameter until you think its the right size or are you measuring with calipers? I remember reading something a while ago about including the pen band on the mandrel as you turn so you can check the blank size as you go along...has anybody heard of this? Also, those of you that do a CA/BLO finish....how do you avoid getting CA on your bushings?

[Nancy Laird]

Aaron, using the center band on your mandrel as a "bushing" is just asking for your center band to be ruined by an errant slip of your tool or the sandpaper. Use the proper bushings (and tubes in the blanks) and turn your blanks down on each end to a point where your fingernail just catches the edge of the wood as you run across from metal to wood. You'll learn by feel how far down to go. Then go to the sandpaper and sand it down to the bushing size, and you'll have it right. You don't really need a caliper to measure unless you are making a matched set of something and want the two to be exactly the same size.

As far as CA finish, I haven't used it and don't intend to do so, so I can't help you there, but there are other threads here and on a couple of pen-turning forums that go through the process in detail.

Nancy

[Stephen Hibbs]

it's not a big issue when your pens stick to the bushings because you can separate them by pulling the pen tube off the mandrel, but with the bushing still on, then just pop the pen part down and they should separate easily. I usually eyeball how much wood is needed to be left since it depends on the quality of the first cuts with the gouge, the grain orientation, and the hardness of the wood. For instance, on spalted soft walnut with endgrain showing, I allow for more sanding to take place than with cocabolo which has a shine from the tool