Celtic Knot Pens #1: One way to do it

Great work Gary. Now we can see how you make those great pens. The pictures help a lot.

-- Bill, Turlock California, http://www.brookswoodworks.com

Thanks Gary! I was just looking for explanations of this process. I was talking to Bob and Wayne about it just yesterday. Thanks for the tutorial!

-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)

Yea, I could not wrap my brain around how that was done. I thought Gary was gluing up entire sections to do that. Now I see it is more like a deep inlay instead.

-- Bill, Turlock California, http://www.brookswoodworks.com

ah hah!!!
thank you so much for sharing this process.

-- ~ Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

Bill, this method takes advantage of the fact that you are turning away alot of the blank. With the piece cut most of the way through, there isn’t the chance of sending that small cutoff flying across the shop with the small piece getting a ride courtesy of a saw tooth, it allows for easier assembly as the contrasting wood as it just slides into the kerf rather than having sliding pieces and trying to clamp them or hold them to glue. You are going to be turning away the 1/16th or so anway. The contrasting piece has to be exactly the kerf of the saw blade for this to work, but as evidenced by Gary’s final product, the trouble is worth it with that sort of outcome!

Thanks Gary! I was going to do this by cutting all the way through. Your method is much safer, producing the same outcome with less trouble.

Cheers!

-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)

Have you tried this method with Corian or other man made materials? Some interesting possibliities are starting to come to mind.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Glad I found this site. I turn a few pens, usually use figured wood, but I like to experiment with new tricks. I checked out your pens along with others projects before I signed up and was impressed. I have not played with the pen lathe for quite some time, reckon I will soon, you gave me some ideas. I will post pictures if I come up with something “new”. All the further I ever got was drilling and doweling blanks for a little color in my “plain wood”. Yours are much sharper.

-- Urban logger, http://nelsonwoodworks.biz/

more unique pens!!
So impressive!!

-- ~ Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

Daren,
Most of what I know about creating pens I’ve learned from two primary sites:
IAP and TPS or from generous friends, most of whom I’ve met online.
I believe experimentation is the road to winning designs, and you’ve got a good foundation started!
Gary

-- Gary, Florida

Thanks Gary for the demo.

-- What happens in the workshop stays in the workshop. No wait that doesn't sound right. Karson Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com †

So theres basicly no limit to the amount of inserts?

As long as there in a uniform pattern, seems easy now Gary.

Gary – just ran across this, I have seen some of your pens and tried to glue separate pieces. Sometime as humans we try to over-engineer what should have been a much simpler process. Thanks for sharing.

-- Joel Tille

Well call me totally disapointed! All I got was a bunch of “x” out boxes,, couldn’t get it to show the pics. any sugestions? In any case I’m totally blowed away by your work. I want a lathe sooooo bad, anybody got an extra one just laying around they want to give away to a poor boy? L.O.L. Any way thanks for sharing I’ll be watching for your post,,, those like all the others here on LJ’s just get me fired up to try them out.

I’m sure there great but I’m not getting the photos.

-- Jim from Heirloom Woodshop Southern Oregon

The links the photos point to are to a web site that’s been long removed.
I’ll be on business travel this coming week. When I return, I’ll see if I can locate the originals and
upload them somewhere else wherein I can update the links.

In the meantime, there’s a downloadable copy of the blog in PDF format available with photos from
the IAP website. Here’s a link to the file: Making an accurate, repeatable Celtic Knot

Enjoy,
G

-- Gary, Florida

Got those, really cool and helped a bunch thanks for sharing and taking the time out to post that. The ex came by and I showed her some on here and in a joking manner { she has been talking about getting into lathe work } I told her you know you can get a lathe and just store it over here cause I know you don’t have room at your place and you can come by and use it all you want, L.O.L. To my surprise she said I’ll think about it. WHOOHOO I might get that freebie after all L.O.L. Keep your fingers crossed, I told her I’d make a list of the tools she will need to go along with it, Band saw , router {mine shot craps L.O.L.} planer, jointer etc etc. just can’t bombard her all at once don’t ya know. L.O.L.Thanks again for the pics.