Pens and bowls and pipes oh my…

Who knew that Bolt-action pens would be a hot item?  I sold all of my first set, and my second set and about half of my third J    Deer antler is pretty popular here, and I’ve added an optional dear head pocket clip too.  In a hunting community like this one, people are practically chomping at the bit.

  

   

I also carved my first pipe out of aged and dried briar.  I guess a lot of people stain them to make them dark, but I left it natural. It was a fun little project, but, as usual,  forgot to take pictures. These pictures are courtesy of www.johnzeuliphotography.com/ .

   

   

My wife and I collaborated on our first clock – I can’t say I had to do much: Some wood, her laser cutter, a little sanding, drilling a hole, and installing the mechanism.  But it looks pretty cool.

I also turned a nice little bowl out of figured maple.  I tried a spalted piece first, but it split along the spalting L  I am not very proficient at bowls yet, and need a couple of accessories to get the inside right, but I’ll get there.  Eventually.  So I worked in Manzanita next.  Manzanita has lots of gaps, which I filled with powdered Turquoise, and powdered Copper – I think it went pretty well.   I enjoyed it enough that I bought 4 more pieces to turn:  Osage orange, Lacewood, Honduras Rosewood, and Chechen. Erica really likes this shape so I haven’t branched out much.  Unfortunately I can’t make anything particularly large – 5 inches in diameter is probably about my limit.

   

  

     

Knifewise, I don’t feel like I’ve made much progress.  I quenched and tempered a tanto  (tried the clay technique to make a fancier hamon) but didn’t seen much development in the polishing process.  With the judicious application of acid, I discovered that the hamon – though present- was really close to the edge.  I tried again with the other Tanto, and managed to pull it back just about the right amount, not to fancy, but a nice wavy line.  The little hunter – which was a lot thicker, managed a little bit of a line towards the point, but not much along the edge – but I did have some issues with the clay falling off.  More practice is needed.

I also just received another rusty stockman’s pocket knife to clean up (see Autumn, Crazy Horse, Uncle Jed and Rust (2011)).  I intend to have a little fun with it once I have it moving again.  It’s not too old (scales are plastic), but it doesn’t take too much to get a knife all rusty and full of crud. 

As I mentioned a few years back in “Pictures from the lathe (2009)” some people think its offensive to clean up a knife.  Removing character is one thing, but restoring function – to my mind- is another.  It’s interesting to see how knives survive the years, but when “character” destroys the knife for all practical purposes, some of the character needs to go. We’ll see if I can fix this one without breaking it like the last stockman.  To date, it is making progress, but not there yet.

Oh yeah, I also made a couple letter openers – One in Ancient Kauri, another in Maple – it was supposed to be birdseye, but apparently I missed all the eyes.  Oh well.

 

But none of that is REALLY news…

Fall 2012

Hi!

Temperatures here in New Mexico are finally beginning to drop, and it is becoming more tempting to start forging again.  Not that there aren’t unfinished blades scattered around the house, but at least its not so hot that standing in a semi enclosed space with a 2000 degree furnace blowing at you might make you pass out.
I actually have made progress on a few knives since my last report several months ago, completing numbers 64-66, each of these was started long enough ago that I will need to do some research to figure out what I made them all out of.

AR64 – 1095 Carbon steel - ~8 inch blade Chef’s knife, Canarywood handle, loveless bolts.

As I have less and less time for knifemaking, finish quality seems to go down.  Whereas early on, I would spend a long time making sure that there were no grinder scratches remaining; now I will let a few go.  Especially for some of the tougher metals (CruForge V for example), it just takes too long to get rid of the last few to be worth it for me.

I generally think that my creativity has suffered as well, I just don’t have time to develop the complex designs that I used to dream about.  Simple handles, simple guards, simple grinds.  That said, AR65 and 66 are a little unusual.  Both are daggers (and I know I’ve ranted about the challenges of daggers before – why do I make things that I know will annoy me, and I think that there is another unfinished one lying around here somewhere), one has a fancy handle (I finally got around to filling the cholla with powdered turquoise, and filing the guard, and grinding the pommel), the other is a little rough and is my first attempt at a wrapped handle, with rawhide no less.

AR65 – Stainless (S35VN) Cholla Dagger, Powdered Turquoise and Copper.

AR66 – 1095 Cold Blued Carbon Steel Primitive Style Dagger, Stained rawhide wrapped handle.

On the first weekend of November I fired up the forge! Twice!! Singed the hair on my arms, caught a few random sparks, but came through mostly unscathed.  I’m working for the first time with W2, and dreaming that I might be able to pull off some nice hamon.   The two are a semi-matched set of hidden tang tanto style blades (OK, they will be – I haven’t cut off the ends yet.  I’ll see if I can pull off a nice set of Tsuba or something. That’s still a little ways away though. No pictures yet.

 I’m also working on a little hunting knife – also in W2.  No pics of this one yet either.

I also tried out a new type of pen – Bolt Action.  They are pretty heavy as far as pens go, with a nice comfortable action.  They look fancy and are fairly simple to turn.  So far I’ve put together:  Desert Ironwood, Manzanita, and Bocote, Ancient Kauri, Macassar Ebony and Spalted Mulberry versions in Gold.

  Here's a sample...

I'd better stop here if I ever want to get this posted.

Talk to you soon...

Of Teeth and Crafts

I hadn’t been to the dentist in a long time.  Then, last December, I had all my wisdom teeth out, and the dentist mentioned that I had some fillings that needed to be addressed.  So I finally got around to getting them filled, and one of my teeth had cracked (no wonder it hurt when I bit things), so I was going to get a crown, but then the root was bad, so I got a root canal, and am still waiting on the final crown. I also learned that I clench my teeth a lot when I am stressed, so I am trying not to do that , despite the occasional work and home stress.

I still haven’t managed to fire up the forge this YEAR, although I have some ideas.  I figured I should probably make some progress on finishing the knives that have been in progress for a long time.  Lately I’ve been able to use the excuse that it was over 100 degrees outside, and getting even warmer in front of a couple thousand degree fire wasn’t all that appealing, but the rains finally showed up yesterday, so it has cooled off a bit now. 

I did pick up some W2 that I am anxious to try out, since I’ve seen people make such nice temper lines with it. Gives me grand ideas for fancy things, but I should probably stick with something a little smaller to start off with.

I’ve almost made progress on a few of them, but have run into some errors – like forgetting to add the hardener to the inlace on a cholla handled dagger  >:-(  I run into those memory lapses all too often.  I think it is because when I do get to work in the shop, I try to do about 15 things at once, and then I make mistakes. Sigh.

I did manage to finish up the handle on the Spyderco Mule (CruWear).  I like Manzanita a lot, looks pretty J

And I made another Bighorn – this one in Damascus and Desert Ironwood. Fancy!

I also have ALMOST finished AR63 – Just needs its number and design mark. And a couple more coats of finish. And some final touches on the edge of course.

AR63. Koa with steel pins. CruForge V Tanto.

In the lathe-y world of wood turning, I picked up some stylus kits for the iPad world and made a few of them, and a stylus pen too.  Haven’t had a chance to get to the new bolt-action pen kits though.  Maybe next week.

Erica got a fancy new toy (I mean tool) though – a 40W laser cutter.  Too bad it doesn’t work on metal.  It’s pretty cool though, it cuts and engraves lots of things.  So in theory, I could laser engrave stuff on handles and sheaths, but I haven’t tried it yet.  We also have a piece of anodized titanium (courtesy of Pat Pruitt – who does lots of cool things with metal – check out his site), that we are going to try, to see if the laser will do anything to the stuff.

That's all for now folks.

Almost nameless post, now with pointless name :)

The beginning of April 2012 already, kind of amazing.

I never posted a blog about moving into the new house, no new pictures of my new workspace, nothing.

I'll blame all that on work, since I was leaving before real light and getting back after dark, things just didn't lend themselves to a strong desire to do more work, especially after taking care of the kids, and having dinner, and sometimes running errands, and occasionally getting some sleep.

Now that time has changed (a couple weeks ago already) there is a little more time in the evening to get a little bit of work done - so I've been really productive right?

Nope...

We did start to put a vegetable garden in the back yard, and some other yard work though :)

And dealt with a little plumbing issue.

The shop is a little better organized, and I've played with the Lathe once or twice, but very little else. I bought a hollow grinder around Christmas so that I can make straight razors, but haven't even opened the box yet.

I added a guard to Uncle Jed's Country Skinner - not too exciting, but functional.

I also picked up a Spyderco Mule Team Blade - the concept is good - they put out blanks of different metals to give people the opportunity to test them out - everything else is identical. And of course, it is up to you to put the handle on. Which I just started to do yesterday.

The one I picked up is Cruwear, which in theory was designed to be a perfect knife steel with excellent sounding chemistry:

Carbon	1.10%
Manganese	0.35%
Silicon	1.10%
Chromium	7.50%
Vanadium	2.40%
Tungsten	1.15%
Molybdenum	1.60%

I also finally got around to putting together the Bighorn folder that I picked up a long time ago. Its a nicely shaped simple single blade lockback folder. I put salt cedar (tamarisk) scales on it, which look pretty nice, in my opinion at least. It went together well enough that I may do a couple more at some point. At least until I decide that I need to start machining my own, with a bunch of tools that I don't have.

If I don't post this now, I probably won't get to it for another three months.

Until then...

A

Goodbye 2011, Welcome 2012

I wrote this blog a while ago, before the last one I posted actually - but never got around to posting it. Probably because I like to have pictures and this doesn't have any. Oh well.

Here it is anyway. At least three full months late.

I swear that that was the shortest year ever. If I wrote checks, I think that I would still be trying to remember if it was 2010 or 2011, and now it’s 2012. Despite that, I lot happened...

Autumn turned 3 years old.

Penelope was born.

I had all 4 wisdom teeth pulled out.

Erica’s business was booming. Pretty much every month was better than the one before it – a little dip for Penelope’s birth, but lots of business. Christmas season this year was scary. Thank you Alex for helping to make it possible.

We bought a house! And mostly moved in. Mostly it’s Erica and my workrooms that need moving at this point, we’ll work on those this weekend I suppose. Hard to want to go back to the old place though. We picked up some cheap and awesome new furniture from consignment shops – higher quality and cheaper than anything you can buy new!

There was a big drought – leaving Albuquerque the driest it has been in at least 50 years. This made for some challenges out on Laguna, but didn’t seem to have much impact on life in town – other than me missing the rain.

There were some big Snow Storms in Laguna! – But they barely touched ABQ, so I got a few snow days in December, but could still get around just fine in town. Nice!

I finished 5 knives all year. Pretty pathetic, especially since I got a new gas forge! – I do have a lot of partially completed ones, but finishing is a bit more of a challenge these days. Maybe with the additional space in the new house I can get a little more accomplished. We’ll see.

I did do quite a bit of woodworking this year – a bunch of pens, some shaving brushes, and miscellaneous other little projects. I have some ideas for more, but without insulation it’s hard to convince myself to work in the shop – or to take care of the kids when Erica is busy.

Maybe next time I'll add some pictures in again :)

I gotta have SPACE!

I gotta have SPACE!

If anyone remembers the animated short “Creature Comforts” (which you can find on youtube), they will certainly remember the Brazilian Mountain Lion and his need for space. That is how I felt in our rental property.

Now, thanks to some substantial help from my Dad, we own a house. With some basic and very rough body measurements and a little math, we estimated the rental at about 900sqft living space. The new house is over 2700! Erica’s workspace is now about 2/3 the size of our old house – which is good since I’m pretty sure she used more than that at least part time.

Especially during the Christmas rush.

I think the old house shrunk during the Christmas rush period too. There wasn’t a flat (or semi-flat) surface anywhere that wasn’t covered in t-shirts, screens, or packaging materials. And no time to clean. I think that if I showed a picture, I would be shot.

Without the assistance of Alex, Erica’s brother, I don’t think we would have made it, and as it is Erica shut down Causticthreads for the season on December 14 to make sure that everything went out the 19th or 20th– the last mailing day to get stuff before Christmas.

In workshop news…not much. I helped Rocketpants finish up a shaving brush, and sold all three that we had listed on etsy. Haven’t even done much with the pens.

I did pick up a big box of Manzanita, but haven’t even opened the box yet to see what I got. Maybe I can make a vase or something – should be pretty if I get around to it.

Between work and children I feel like I have been too stressed out to do much, but maybe the new house will inspire something. After we finish moving in of course.

In honor of my blog and logo – I bought a t-shirt from Robotarot – the Hanged Man of course – check out his others, they are equally awesome! And then awesomeness of awesomeness I recieved a print of the picture for Christmas! #1 of 10! Thanks Rocketpants!!!

Oh – and we bought a new digital SLR! A Canon T2i. Nice. Hope to have pictures to share soon.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Late July, er.. August, no wait October 2011- Ends of Eras

Late August 2011- Ends of Eras

The end of the one child era:

When I started this post more than three months ago, the imminent arrival of our newest daughter Penelope, stress levels in the design studio had increased. This meant that I was stressed out at the time, because the studio is all in my head. Not that I am any less busy now, but stress levels seem to have decreased somewhat.

Little Penny arrived on July 25, 5 days early, satisfying both Erica, who wanted it to be a little early, and me, because I didn’t get the call while I was at work.

She's grown a bit since July :)

I made quite a bit of pen progress prior to her arrival, and a little afterward, and Erica has taken pictures of them now, so they are in my ballpark again to write up descriptions for them for posting at the store (www.acrylicandsteel.etsy.com).

I’ve now made slimline, slimline pro, Designer NT, Polaris, .30 cal bullet, and big cigar rollerball/ballpoint pens, some fountain pens (several styles), two sketch pencils, several light pulls, a salt grinder, a bottle stopper, and a ice cream scoop. I'm probably missing some at this point. Wood turning is fun!

I tried to make a few more than I have, and made a few mistakes. I tried several times to make an Ancient Kauri pen, with a variety of problems. I did manage a AK light pull though. Hopefully by the time I finish this post I will have been successful. I've broken a couple of click pens, not sure why they aren't working right - so far only one success on those.

Friend Bill, who will be off to Art School in London in a couple of weeks, enlisted my aid in making a special pen for a friend, and whipped up a nice simple maple slimline for himself. Bills gone for a year and we miss him, but the pen got finished and a similar one for a friend of the friend as a result!

Friends Pen

Friend of Friends Pen

I just wrapped up a pair of knives, both for family, a nice hunter and a santoku style kitchen knife. Still have 8-9 in the moderately close phase, but not there yet. The most recent of all was an interesting hunter/fighter knife that I made for friend Rocketpants' trip to Australia. I finished it in time, and it went off and returned with him.

The end of the charcoal forge era:

In addition to being a proud father of a new child, I am also the proud owner of a NEW FORGE!!! Finally, I’ve moved from my interesting but inconsistent charcoal forge to a gas NC Tool Whisper Forge. Hopefully this will give me a little more flexibility, a more rapid heat up, a higher temp, etc…

Sadly, I haven't had the time or mental energy lately to work much on it, but it is a lot faster to get going..

This brings me to the experimental phase:

Mokume gane – I’ve stacked about 24 layers of brass, copper and nickel-silver sandwiched in steel, heated and hammered. Results...Not so good, some bits worked, other bits didn't. Probably the wrong kind of flux. Better luck next time.

Wire Damascus – Using some nasty rusty wire from some flood barriers, I’ve heated, fluxed and hammered. I’m not happy with it at this point, so I will probably do it again, or fold and repeat. I think the rust may have interfered with a good weld. Definitely need to work on my forge welding skills - all of my welding skills are pretty much non-existent though.

I think I'll leave it at that.

Happy Halloween Everyone!