Anyone engraving pens?

jeanluc83

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I realized a while back that I have not used cursive in almost 20 years and I'm only 32. Over the last few months I have decided to relearn cursive. It has been surprisingly interesting. There is a lot more to it than I remembered.

As part of my relearning I discovered a entire world of pens out there. The nibs tend to have some engraving but overall there seems to be a lack of fine engraving. Most of what you find are pens with a couple lines of text from those engraving places in the mall. I did find one good example.
http://www.engravingarts.com/pgGal3_tighepenMonarch3.html

I found a couple of pens that look like they would be great to practice on.
http://www.jetpens.com/Kaweco-Brass-Sport-Fountain-Pen-Fine-Nib-Brass-Body/pd/13984
http://www.jetpens.com/Kaweco-Liliput-Fountain-Pen-Fine-Nib-Eco-Brass-Body/pd/13698

Is there anyone out there doing work on pens that they would be willing to share?
 

Arnaud Van Tilburgh

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I did some lettering on these famous Belgium pens

[video=youtube;woXYnyvnsDc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=woXYnyvnsDc[/video]
 

monk

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sam alfano, our benevolent landlord has done a few, including the nibs !! there was an individual some time ago that began doing pens. check the search bar-- info may be there.
 

monk

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the holding fixture in arnauds' video is a grs contour vise. originally designed to hold knives for engraving. as you see, the vise will hold just about anything that will fit between the jaw links. it's made from common bicycle chain.
 

dhall

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Ray Cover has done some incredible pen engraving. Check out his Café interview, then Google "Ray Cover pen engraving"; it'll knock your socks off!
 

Dani Girl

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One of Ray's. One of my favorites



For around a hundred you can get these in copper, s/steel or brass... also aluminum but I'd avoid that one. Would anyone care to share the easiest way to engrave around something so curved that you have to turn all the time?

Any other cheaper pens for newbies like me to practice on?

Thanks,

Danae.
 

monk

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One of Ray's. One of my favorites



For around a hundred you can get these in copper, s/steel or brass... also aluminum but I'd avoid that one. Would anyone care to share the easiest way to engrave around something so curved that you have to turn all the time?

Any other cheaper pens for newbies like me to practice on?

Thanks,

Danae.
yes. get some junk copper tubing of a similar diameter. and practice ! doing such a tight curve requires much attention to maintaining and changing holding angles. this is a case where the "feel" for what you're doing becomes very important. i never used power assist for cutting like this. instead, turn off the power and just push. the cuts are so shallow, power really not needed. jmho
 

jeanluc83

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Thanks for the info. That is the kid of work I want to see.

I tried the forum search feature. The problem being it ignores short words like pen. Searching for pen engraving doesn't do much good.

Any other cheaper pens for newbies like me to practice on?

Unfortunarly, in the world of pens, these are cheap. You can get brass rod on eBay for fairly cheap. A quick inquery would probably get you the aloy the pens are machined from.
 

Big-Un

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Would a fixture like a barrel holder for SAA barrels work?



One of Ray's. One of my favorites



For around a hundred you can get these in copper, s/steel or brass... also aluminum but I'd avoid that one. Would anyone care to share the easiest way to engrave around something so curved that you have to turn all the time?

Any other cheaper pens for newbies like me to practice on?

Thanks,

Danae.
 

Marrinan

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The orange colored bar clamps at home depot work real well, Takes a tiny bit of modification to make a barrel, pen or gun an you have a handy vice. Fred
 
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