Archive for the ‘Pens – Ballpoint’ Category
5
Oct
Posted by uniquetreen in Alder, Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
These two pens are made from
Alder (
Alnus rubr) harvested from a friend’s swamp he was trying to reclaim. I probably pulled close to three cords of it out of the mud and blackberries on his back forty. Although it’s technically a hardwood, Alder is very soft and surprisingly difficult to turn at the pen scale. However, it’s pleasant wood to work with, it smells nice and you can use the sawdust to smoke meat on your grill.
Mechanism: Cross style, and refills are readily available in most office supply stores.
Finish: The pens were sanded up to 400 grit, then burnished with 0000 steel wool to bring up a smooth surface. It was then finished with mineral oil, bee’s & carnauba wax and a final polish with paraffin wax.
Price: US$35 per pen
Item Ref No: ASP0023 (right) and ASP0024
Status: Gifted but similar pens may be available. Click here to inquire.
13
Jul
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Osage Orange, Pens, Pens - 0.50 Caliber BMG, Pens - Ballpoint, Peruvian Walnut, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. 2 comments
These pens are made from once-fired .50 caliber BMG (Browning Machine Gun) shell casings. The turning of the pens is relatively straight forward but the assembly was less so and took some figuring out.
The
Peruvian Walnut (dark brown, left in top photo) has some nice grain to it and I’ve always liked turning this particular species. The
Osage Orange has some nice cathedral grain and I cut a faux cannelure groove into it to simulate a real bullet using an AP round that was given to me as a gift.
Mechanism: Cross style twist ballpoint mechanism.
Finish: The wood was sanded to 400 grit then polished up to 0000 steel wool. A wax & oil finish was then applied. The brass shell casing was sanded to 800 wet & dry, then up through 0000 steel wool, and finally polished with silver polish to a soft luster. Since these are once-fired brass, there are dings & scuffs from the firing, extraction and collecting processes.
Price: US$40
Item Ref No: OO-50BMGP0049 (Osage Orange) and PW-50BMGP0050 (Peruvian Walnut)
Status: Sold but similar pens may be available. Click here to inquire.
9
Jun
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Mpingo, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
Mpingo (
Dalbergia melanoxylon) is commonly known as African Blackwood and frequently used in the manufacture of musical instruments due to it’s high density and ability to take a fine finish. While this pen looks like it’s all black, there is actually some swirling grain that shows up as reddish undertones that’s difficult to photograph. You’ll really like the weight of this pen because the wood is very dense, so the pen is heavier than you expect and feels nice in the hand.
Mechanism: Cross style in gold with black accents.
Finish: Bee’s, carnauba and paraffin wax with mineral oil. Sanded to 0000 steel wool.
Price: US$35
Item Ref No: MSP0029
Status: Sold but a similar pen may be available. Click here to inquire.
While this pen looks like it’s been cut from two different blanks, there really was that sharp of a demarcation in the wood. Mpingo is a joy to work with. It’s hard and tools almost like a plastic, and takes a wonderful finish. The nicest parts are the red undertones that you simply can’t see in the photo, especially on the lower barrel where it appears black, but if you bring it out into the sun, you’ll see the red beneath the surface. Beautiful!
Mechanism: A Cross style mechanism in gun metal gray.
Finish: Bee’s, carnauba and paraffin wax with mineral oil. Sanded to 0000 steel wool.
Price: US$35
Item Ref No: MSP0022
Status: Sold but a similar pen may be available. Click here to inquire.
Photo above by Jennifer Tai Photo Artistry
8
Jun
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Ipe, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
Ipé (
Tabebuia chrysantha) is an incredibly dense wood, so dense it sinks in water, and won’t sustain a flame. It’s most common use in the US is for making decks. It’s naturally insect & rot resistant, and a number of famous boardwalks are made from it, like the one in Ocean City New Jersey. It’s density makes it difficult to work, and it quickly dulls your tools. I acquired this particular lot of Ipé from a guy who started building a deck from it and discovered he was allergic to it. He sold me all his decking and was glad to see it gone. Although the wood is a dark brown in color, the saw dust is actually green for some reason. It’s also a pretty good irritant, so, if you don’t wear a mask, you’ll probably be coughing for a couple of days afterwards. The wood takes a lustrous finish and you’ll like the heaviness of the pen.
Mechanism: The mechanism is Cross style and refills are readily available in most office supply stores.
Finish: The pen was sanded up to 400 grit, then burnished with 0000 steel wool to bring up a smooth surface. It was then finished with mineral oil, bee’s & carnauba wax and a final polish with paraffin wax.
4
Jun
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Black and White Ebony, Handmade, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
This pen is made from Black & White Ebony (Diospyros embryopteris) which is also known as Pale Moon Ebony or White Ebony. There are so many species of Ebony in the world that it’s sometimes difficult to classify what you’re working with, but I’m pretty sure this is correct.I bought the wood from a woodcraft store that offers off-cuts from custom shops.
The two blanks for this pen were cut from the same piece of wood but the black lace only showed up in the upper piece. Striking, huh?
Mechanism: The mechanism is Cross style and refills are readily available in most office supply stores.
Finish:The pen was sanded up to 400 grit, then burnished with 0000 steel wool to bring up a smooth surface. It was then finished with mineral oil, bee’s & carnauba wax and a final polish with paraffin wax.
Price: US$35
Item Ref No: BWESP0015
Status: Gifted but a similar pen may be available. Click here to inquire.
Photo by Jennifer Tai Photo Artistry
3
Jun
Posted by uniquetreen in Alder, Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Ifil, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
These two pens were custom ordered for my client to be used as gifts on a trip to Japan.
The pens are made from Alder (top), and Ifil (bottom). Alder is technically a hardwood, but is actually very soft and surprisingly difficult to turn in small scale. When turning bowls, it’s a lot of fun because it’s very straight grained and easy to turn, but when turning pens, it likes to split on the brass barrels when it gets thin, making it a pain to deal with. Still worth the trouble as the pen is an elegant piece.
Ifil on the other hand is almost schizophrenic, the dark wood you see is hard as rock, and the lighter beige is almost rotten soft. I have to turn the blank down close to it’s final dimension, then soak it in cyanoacrylate (CA) glue to stabilize the punky beige part so it’ll turn more like the harder dark sections. In the end it makes for a beautiful pen, and the two-tone look is very striking. My brother gave me the Ifil which is a South East Asian wood as far as I know. I have not been able to find more information about this wood. The Alder (alnus rubr) is from a fallen tree on a friend’s property in Sultan, here in Washington State.
Mechanisms: Both are Cross style mechanisms, made from Slimline pen kits.
Finish: The Alder pen was finished with mineral oil, bee’s & carnauba wax. The Ifil pen was finished with a mixture of turpentine, shellac, bee’s & carnauba waxes and mineral oil.
Price: US$35 per pen.
Item Ref No: ASP0020, ISP0019
Status: Sold but similar pens may be available. Click here to inquire.
11
May
Posted by uniquetreen in African Blackwood, Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Mpingo, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. 1 comment
This pen is made from
Mpingo (
Dalbergia melanoxylon) commonly known as African Blackwood. Turning this particular pen was fun because it was the first time I’d made anything from it. I was pleased to learn how easy it was to work, and how nice a finish it took. Although the pen looks like it’s all black, there are reddish undertones that just don’t seem to photograph well, but take it into the sun and you’ll be surprised to see that it’s not actually black.
Mechanism: Cross style Slimline pen kit. Refills are readily available in most office supply stores.
Finish: Sanded to 0000 steel wool, then finished with bee’s, carnauba & paraffin wax with mineral oil.
Photo by Jennifer Tai Photo Artistry
9
May
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Mahogany and Ash Lamination, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
The wood for this pen is laminated
Mahogany (which has many different species so it’s hard to tell which one this specifically is) &
Ash (
Fraxinus excelsior) from the ruin of a broken tiller from our sailboat. The break happened on one of our recent trips and I was dumbfounded because I’d just refinished the entire tiller only a few months before. An examination of the break showed that the Ash had dry rotted while the Mahogany was just fine. Water had intruded into the wood through screw holes for my tiller extension, and my refinishing had only made it worse by sealing the moisture inside. I decided to make a pen from the broken handle, and this is the result. A friend liked it and bought it from me.
Mechanism: Cross style, and refills are readily available in most office supply stores. The kit is a slimline.
Finish: Bee’s, carnauba, and paraffin wax with mineral oil.
Price: US$35
Item Ref No: MALSP0009
Status: Sold but a similar pen may be available. Click here to inquire.
Photo by Jennifer Tai Photo Artistry
8
May
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Manzanita Burl, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Sold, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. 1 comment
Manzanita is of the
Genus arctostaphylos and means “little apple” in Spanish. My brother gave me a box full of small off-cuts from his bow making efforts a while back and in it was
a small piece of Manzanita Burl. I made a couple of pens out of it, one for him, and another for my brother-in-law when he admired the first one. I thought I was out of it, but found another smaller piece, just enough for one pen. This pen was purchased for a Father’s day gift and my client had it laser engraved with his dad’s initials. The wood is nice to turn but because of the burl, the grain of the wood is going in all different directions. This makes for a pretty pen, but a headache for me. A normal pen takes about an hour to make while one of these is closer to three due to the time spent using cyanoacrylate (CA) glue to keep the pieces in one piece. It’s not uncommon to have to soak the pen in CA glue several times to stabilize the wood. You also spend extra time sharpening your tools because the twisted grain demands very sharp tools.
Mechanism: The mechanism is Cross style and refills are readily available in most office supply stores.
Finish: The pen was sanded up to 400 grit, and then up to 0000 steel wool. I applied a coat of mineral oil followed by bee’s, carnauba and paraffin wax to put a nice usable finish on it.
Engraving: Laser engraved with initials in Amaze Bold 14 pt. font.
Price: US$35
Item Ref No: MBSP0008
Status: Sold but a similar pen may be available. Click here to inquire.
7
May
Posted by uniquetreen in Available for Custom Order, Handmade, Holly, Pens, Pens - Ballpoint, Treen, Unique Gifts, Wood. Leave a comment
A couple of years ago, a friend’s house burned down mysteriously. He would eventually sell the property it sat on, but not before cutting down a few trees that had been damaged in the fire. This
Holly (
Ilex …?, one of 600 or so species – your guess is as good as mine!) was right in front of the house and dying. He gave me several pieces about six feet long and around 8-10″ in diameter. What I didn’t realize when I went out to pick it up was how heavy it was going to be. It was a bit of a grunt getting all the pieces up into my truck, but I finally did.Holly is really nice to work with. It’s very hard, and machines almost like metal, taking a very fine finish right from the knife and doesn’t require a lot of sanding. I made this particular pen for my friend as a thank you & birthday gift. I’m looking forward to making many more things from the Holly he gave me.
Mechanism: The mechanism is Cross style and refills are readily available in most office supply stores.
Finish: The pen was sanded up to 400 grit, then burnished with 0000 steel wool to bring up a smooth surface. It was then finished with mineral oil, bee’s & carnauba wax and a final polish with paraffin wax.
Price: US$35
Item Ref No: HSP0007
Status: Gifted but a similar pen may be available. Click here to inquire.
Photo by Jennifer Tai Photo Artistry
These two pens are made from Alder (Alnus rubr) harvested from a friend’s swamp he was trying to reclaim. I probably pulled close to three cords of it out of the mud and blackberries on his back forty. Although it’s technically a hardwood, Alder is very soft and surprisingly difficult to turn at the pen scale. However, it’s pleasant wood to work with, it smells nice and you can use the sawdust to smoke meat on your grill.
Unique Treen 