graver helper

[Dale Hatfield]

Cutting while holding in hand will make for a bloody mess sooner or later. Heck most here have stabbed themselves with a vice . Raise your bloody hand.
Im thinking a sliding clamp modified to hold both ends of pen. Place backbone of clamp in vice.

 

[Marcus Hunt]

My Mrs hates me spending money but when it comes to tools for my business she backs me the whole way; be it a Palm Control or new scope she understands that its an absolute necessity for a professional business.

If you are engraving plastics there is no reason at all that hand pushing won't suffice. But even when I cut soft silver on Conway Stewart pens I prefer air power nowadays as the graver is far less likely to slip on such a tight radius.

Personally, I still agree with Sam's previous advice. Start with cutting your designs on the flat until you can cut them easily and evenly. Then, as I said, start with a less tight radius so you get used to your angle of attack and when you can cut easily and without thinking about your graver angle move on to a radius the same as your pens. This is essential if you want to hand push your designs and to improve.

A final word of advice regarding your engraving. I know you're keen and you want to get your pens out there but slow down and make sure you are ready to do so. It's all very well having one guy who knows nothing about engraving oogying over them but if a hundred people who see them think they're crap you'll quickly get a reputation as a crap engraver which is something I'm sure you'll be keen to avoid as reputation is everything in this game.

With properly set up tools and working on plastics there is no reason you shouldn't be cutting your pens to a reasonable standard fairly quickly (invest in a sharpening system). I engrave limited edition pens for Conway Stewart every so often and every edition sells out as it hits the market. This is the position you want to be in with your pens but you'll only get there if you deliver a high quality product.