u/Objective_Reality232

I’m trying to start a small business selling pens and other things I turn and have been busy building up stock. I’ve turn 4 pens similar to this one in the last few days and then 5 more of the Majestic Squire pen kit. I recently found someone to supply me a ton of Amboyna burls which will keep me going for a while at least. I’ve been selling 2-5 pens per week for 250 a pop for the last few months so it’s going well, we will see how a website does!

I love the majestic pen kits, I’m starting my own business and am building stock to sell on my website. I’ve turned 4 of these in the last few days along with some of the Majestic Squire kits. I recently found a supplier overseas that provided me with enough triple A+ Amboyna Burl to last a life time. I’m charging 250 a pen with the leather case, would you charge more? I think I could get more but am not sure what the demand is like. I’ve sold 2-5 pens per week at this price for the last few months so it’s going well. Thanks for taking a look at my work!

I’m still trying to find the right finish over India ink. I used BLO this time and it came out splotchy so that’s not fun but it was fun turning a hollow form for the first time in a while! At least the BLO isn’t as shiny as the shellac I tried last time. I got a pretty consistent thickness throughout the bowl thanks to my Simple Hollowing System that hasn’t seen use in a while. My complication with turning hollow forms is getting a smooth interior. My wife said it looks like a tit so now I have to get rid of it. I’ll probably give it to a coworker who has been asking me to make something for her.

Very happy with this one! I did a glue up of the Amboyna and box elder sandwiched between ebony veneer. I think the gold hardware really works well with the rest of the pen. This was a commissioned piece for 500 USD. They specifically requested this style and layout of woods. They said they wanted a band of light wood and the rest to be a darker red wood. They wanted the nicest wood available and I think I delivered. This was my first time turning Amboyna and it was a ton of fun. 10/10 would recommend if you can get your hands on some!

The first is a red mallee Burl majestic squire with gold and gun metal. The second is a box elder Burl with red glitter epoxy with majestic gun metal roller ball. I personally think Majestic makes the top tier pen kits that are really hard to beat. Both were commissioned for 200 a piece.

Pen number 1 is a red mallee Burl, the second is box elder Burl with red glitter epoxy. Both with different types of majestic pen kits both turned tonight. I’m getting good at this in that the red mallee pen took me 30 minutes start to finish. I’m selling a ton of pens recently which has limited my bowl turning time, but who cares, I’m making almost 1500 a month now just doing something I was going to do anyway!

Photography is always something I struggled with, how do I take a picture of something I worked hard on that would show it the same way I see it in front of me? The simple answer was a shadow box! This thing was 30 bucks on amazon and is such a good piece of equipment, these two pictures were my first attempt and I think I could do a lot better with practice. I’m very happy with both of the pens and the shadow box, I highly recommend it!

Btw I did order a pen stand that would hold the pen at an upward angle but I broke it trying to unwrap the packaging.

My wife and kids went to visit some family out of town today so I had a good chunk of time after work to get some quality turning in. I’ve had this piece of maple sitting around for a while and decided to make something cool. I wish I made a lid before I put the finish on. Maybe tomorrow I’ll make a lid, I just need to find a piece of maple this nice!

I’ve gotten my time for each to about an hour and I sell them for 200 a pop. In recent weeks I’ve been selling 3-5 a week, my profit on these pens is about 100 a piece. Today I sold 3! Depending on what the customer wants I offer handmade leather cases or these wood cases from PSI. Either way an excellent kit and I’m very happy with this one!

It’s pretty hard to get a good picture of this bowl, the deep black makes it difficult to show. This is a 3”x8” piece of ash that I just finished, I used India ink for the first time to ebonize it and finished with a glossy spray on shellac.

First off I really don’t like turning ash, the tear out was so difficult to get rid of even with razor sharp tools and super light finishing passes, I needed to do a lot of sanding. India ink might be thinner than water I found out, even with me being careful it got every where lol. Thankfully I did it outside where it didn’t matter and I wore gloves so my hands are black. I found to be more difficult than I thought to get an even coat, there are spots that turned out more dark brown than black even though I did three coats. I did some light sanding with 800 grit paper between each coat which I think helped. Before the shellac finish I was pretty happy with the outcome.

I read online that a shellac finish is popular with this technique, however I should have read my can and saw that I was using glossy instead of matte. Next time I would use mineral spirits or poly instead, the glossy takes away from the India ink and the shape of the bowl and makes it feel like plastic that’s probably why I don’t use shellac often. Overall I’m happy with the bowl, just wish I used a different finish, if you haven’t tried India ink you should give it a shot.

One of the more difficult projects I’ve done as I don’t normally turn epoxy or end grain. This olive wood slab was the base of a tree cut down near our local VFW years ago. They gave my neighbor a few slices approx. 3” thick and he asked if I could turn it into something. The bowl is 13.5” in diameter and 2” deep at the center. Sanded to 800 grit and finished with BLO. In some deeper areas where the epoxy didn’t penetrate I did a mineral inlay, I left some of the larger gaps empty to give it some character. The figuring in the wood was incredible, overall a very fun project with some profit to be made.

One of the more difficult projects I’ve done as I don’t normally turn epoxy or end grain. This olive wood slab was the base of a tree cut down near our local VFW years ago. They gave my neighbor a few slices approx. 3” thick and he asked if I could turn it into something. The bowl is 13.5” in diameter and 2” deep at the center. Sanded to 800 grit and finished with BLO. In some deeper areas where the epoxy didn’t penetrate I did a mineral inlay, I left some of the larger gaps empty to give it some character. The figuring in the wood was incredible, overall a very fun project with some profit to be made.

How do you all take such good pictures of your projects? I’ve done some reading and try to get better pictures but they still don’t look as good.

This bowl is a commissioned piece. I guess like 15 years ago our local VFW cut down an olive tree and one of the members cut the tree into big slabs. He gave me a few slabs and I’m working my way through them. As you can see this one was really messed up so I had to cast it in resin. To make this piece even more difficult this is all end grain so I’m taking it slow and sharpening often. I’ve been turning for about a decade now and have never really turned resin before. Other than pens. The only thing I was able to really cut a nice smooth cut with was my skew chisel. My finger nail gouge and roughing gouge did nothing but shoot tiny pieces of resin at my fingers at light speed. I can’t get a single good cut on the resin. Is there a trick? When I use something other than the skew the resin exploded and leaves large chips, I’m turning at 750 rpm and the diameter is close to 13”.

This is a 14” slab of olive wood that someone gave me years ago. Back then I wanted to turn the slab as is with the bark and branches and everything but decided I wasn’t skilled enough. I had glued a piece of sacrificial cherry to act as the tenon. Fast forward to today and I cut this 14” piece out of the slab, it was the biggest area I could get without all the branches and bark. The piece had a ton of checks and cracks so I cast it in resin. I couldn’t cut through the cherry before casting no matter what I did, I was burning the wood with my bandsaw and couldnt get any ground with a hand saw. I just mounted it on the lathe using a faceplate on the other side and locked it in place. I used a reciprocating saw to cut the cherry off and found out pretty quick that I originally mounted the piece and put a face plate on there and broke some screws. No wonder it was so hard to cut off. How do I get these screws out? I wanted this to be the bottom, I have no idea how long they are. I’m frustrated at younger me.

Edit: it’s not a tortilla or a frying pan or a wheel of brie lol.

I almost exclusively turn wood. I’m not good at making exact cuts with any level of precision. I had an order of pens and the customer asked me to make a box that could be used to hold them all and I told him I would give it my best shot but I wouldn’t charge him for it knowing what it might look like lol. I wouldn’t some way of hiding the inside and chose to try flocking. I watched a few YouTube videos and this is the result. Where did I go wrong? I applied glue pretty evenly, I’m assuming that’s the issue? Thanks for any advice!

I was given a few huge slabs of olive wood, each were between 21 and 40 inches wide but I was only able to get 12” blanks out them. Each of them are 2.5 to inches deep. The rest of the cut offs will be used for something else. As you can see there’s lots of large checks and cracks and missing pieces of wood. The center was punky and I was able to scrape it out by hand the rest is solid wood. I am thinking the only solution here is to cast these in resin. It will be my second time pouring resin, I don’t have a pressure vessel to pull a vacuum. The first time was years ago and I screwed it up. So I need to do this slow and ensure no bubbles. Before pouring resin do I need to stabilize it? How do I fill voids inside the bowl? Thanks for the help!