Making slimlines again...

Though my very first pen was a slimline (they are easiest to make, as the halves are interchangeable), I have been avoiding making them because it seems that you lose a lot of wood in the process. If you start with a store-bought pen blank, what you are left with when the slimline pen is made (percentagewise) is not a lot. Most of the blank ends up as shavings on the floor of the woodshop.

However, now that I am cutting my OWN blanks, I can cut them smaller if I know that I am making a slimline pen from them. Conversely, if I cut the blanks badly for a bigger style of pen, I can use the badly-cut blanks for slimline pens.

Cases in point are the two slimlines (one pen, one pencil) I made tonight. The kits were ones that I bought at Woodcraft back when I thought I would be making a lot of slimline pens. The first is made from Bocote, and the kit is a Satin Pearl slimline kit. The wood and the kit do not go together very well:



The second was an American Slimline Pencil kit that I made with cocobolo wood. This one came out very well. I may get more of these type of kit:



The lesson, as always: Don't throw anything away. Most things that are not useful for one project will come in handy for another one.