Beginner's Guide To Penmaking

Turning the blanks
After allowing the glue to set up, I used a sanding disc to true the ends of the blanks against the metal tubes, then mounted my first set of blanks on the mandrel and began the turning process.

Photo6: Blanks mounted on the mandrel, tightened and then installed on the lathe..

Photo7: Beginning the turning process - lathe is actually spinning, the shutter speed of the camera makes it appear to be stopped.

When the wood was removed to within about 1/8" of the bushings I switched to sandpaper to finish. As I became more confident in later turnings I could remove more wood before going to sandpaper. I would imagine that your personal skill level and preference have a lot to do with this.

Photo8: This is the 320 grit. I started with 100, then 220, 320 and finally 600.

After sanding out all imperfections and finishing off with the 600 grit paper, I applied the HUT polish to the blanks with the lathe spinning, then turned up the speed and used a paper towel to melt the polish onto the wood and create a beautiful finish.

After removing the blanks from the mandrel there is a slight edge of polish where the blank meets the bushings. I removed this by lightly sanding the end of the blank. I think there would be several methods to use for this - whatever works for you.

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