pink ivory

[Harry Goodwin]

I've been making pens for years and today was surprized to find the lower
portion of one of my cigar pens waiting for sale was cracked plenty. Since I've only had two pens crack in the past and those possibly from other causes my question is is pink ivory a wood that is subject to cracking more than others. The pen had some meat to it and I was ssurprized at the result. Harry

[Jon Behnke]

I've heard that pink ivory is prone to cracking, ebony apparently is too. I haven't done any pens with either so I haven't had the issue myself.

[Harry Goodwin]

Thanks for the help Jon. Harry

[Dean Matthews]

Odd... I have done a couple of wine stopper goblets out of Pink Ivory and have had no trouble with cracking.

That is the extent of my experience with it though.

[Gary Herrmann]

Only made one pen from pink ivory so far, and it cracked a bit. #2 is coming up, so we'll see. For the SIL, so I hope not.

Dean, there's more meat to a bottle stopper, so I wonder if they'd be less likely to crack? Dunno.

[Mark Hix]

I've done about 5 or 6 in Pink Ivory and did not have any crack. The oldest one is about 1 yr old and is used daily by my wife. The finish was CA. Could if have already had a small crack?

[Don Carter]

Harry,
I have made around 25 pink ivory pens and I have had one crack. It cracked when I was pressing in the the parts. I have never had an ebony pen crack. PI is beautiful wood and I do take more care when making them. All the best.

[Doug Miller]

Brittle woods like PI and any of the other really hard woods, I'll usually drill them just a hair oversized and then use thick CA. I know others will use either epoxy or even Gorilla glue. Seems a bit of overkill to me. The thick CA works just fine. Try to be careful with the sanding process as well. You need to avoid creating heat in the wood as much as possible. Seems that if you produce too much heat you can set up a process that will cause the blank to set up stresses within the wood. As those stresses bounce back and force it gets to a point where something has to give. Since the tube cannot give, the wood is the loser. Snake wood is very bad about it. Hope this helps some.

[Harry Goodwin]

Your wisdom was great thanks. Harry

[Bernie Weishapl]

Harry I did a pen and a wine stopper out of pink ivory. The pen split but the wine stopper is fine. I know I was told pink ivory is prone to cracking.

[robert hainstock]

Six out of eight ebony blanks cracked, but so far the pink ivory is holding. The ebony cracked in the winter month at low humidity times. I am watching the P I.:eek::eek::o:o:)
Bob

[Wes Bischel]

Harry,
If you're keeping count - I made 2 pink ivory pens and both cracked about 3 months after they were finished. I figured it was due to the wood having too much moisture in it and it dried out - not sure about that now.
Hope you have better luck.

Wes