So this may be a silly question

[Matt Wolboldt]

I was turning my first european pen this evening. I followed the directions in cutting the blank size, but after all the turning and finishing the body turned out to be too long. For future reference should I just size the pen blank sections to the tubes? Thanks! Here's a pic of the pen, bolivian rosewood.

[Rich Stewart]

In a word, "yes". The body of the pen has to be exactly the same length as the tube. If you going to be making pens, go ahead and get yourself one of them barrel trimmers. I waited on getting one and ruined a bunch of pens.

http://www.woodzone.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=191054&Category_Code=pen_kit_tooling

[Mark Hix]

The trimmer will make life easier. Besides giving you a square end of the blank (in relation to the tube) you will have the tube flush with the end of the blank. This is important because with some of the kit styles, you do not have much material left at the end of the barrell. The pressure from writing would split the blank without the tube adding support. There are styles that it will not matter and even tubeless pens but for Slims, Euros and other similar pens, you need the support.

[Matt Wolboldt]

Thanks for the help!