Thread: First truestone

I admire anyone who can do these on a woodlathe hehe! always worth the effort ,I have to do a baron fountain pen tomorrow in black with gold lace truestone ,metal lathe and carbide tips for me .Funny how people are attracted to these from a bunch of pens on a display stand ,they just seem to "ooze " quality They seem to sand ok so you can save a bit of effort by knocking most of the corners off on a linisher . Cheers ~ for a great effort John

thanks John. I was told i'd need carbide tools to do it but i thought i'd just give it a go with wood tools.

I was going to knock the corners off but i don't really have anything suitable for doing it quickly. I just turned from square to round with the skew as i do for most pens. It's not a material you can rush but it's certainly one with which you can apply lessons learned.

Another thing I heard was to knock off the corners on a bandsaw, just need a jig to hold them secure ,easily done . We never stop learning ,I have not taken too well to acrylics done quite few and always a pain to me , today I made a new tool to do them and can take a 7/8 square blank to a sierra size in about 10 mins with no digins or shattering , think I will enjoy the acrylics a lot more now cheers ! john

sounds like an interesting tool John. I tend to have the most trouble with acrylics from carbatec. They seem very brittle. The ones from wood n workshop (no affilation) are easier i find because they aren't as brittle.

I like acrylics but i'm trying to slow down on buying them. I seem to be collecting blanks much quicker than i turn pens and i'm running out of space

Well done, that's a beautiful pen.

Stunning pen well done

thanks guys. I'm gonna try to get some of the black with gold webbing blanks next. I hear that it's one of the hardest true stones to turn but i think it'll be worth it.

Big reward on having done all with the skew, great looking pen. Amos-ps always avoid heat, specially towards the end and polishing.Amos

thanks amos. One of the reasons i do pens with a skew. This way i can often start sanding at closer to 320 grit. Also wet sanding helps i think. I've been told that imperial stone is much harder so i'm gonna see if the skew likes it when i get some. Might need to upgrade the skew to a harder steel.