Some bottle stoppers
Dominic Greco at home in sunny Richboro, PA
>Hello Everyone,
Here are a couple of pics of (3) bottle stoppers I turned this past weekend. They were turned using the PSI chrome and rubber stopper kits. Shown from left to right: they are Maple Burl with Turquoise, Figured Cherry, and Olive wood. The stoppers were all sanded to 600 grit, then sanded with Micromesh to 12000. After that, a Pad Lacquer (friction polish) was applied. I used PSI's Pad Lacquer friction polish. They sell a wood sealer, a semi gloss, and a high gloss. I gave each stopper about 4 coats of each finish. I liked it so much, I think I'm going to be using this as my "go to" finish for pens as well.
After the finish was applied, I buffed the stoppers with white diamond, then carnuaba wax. (I know, I know. Renaissance wax would be the next logical step. But I don't have any yet. It's on order and will be here on the 9th.)
I know I could have made a mandrel myself. But I actually went and purchased the bottle stopper mandrel and drill kit from PSI at the same time. Heck, it was only $10.00. I was actually quite impressed with how well it worked. And since it only came in 1"-8 TPI, I HAD to get my Midi out from under the work bench and set it up. I forgot how much fun it was using that baby.
I know this sort of reads like a PSI commercial. But they had the supplies I needed. And they seem to have undergone a change for the better in terms of in-store service. I like dealing with the people there much more than I used to.
The funny thing about the blanks for this project, aside from the olive wood, they all came from the trash bin! When I first started looking around for wood for bottle stopper blanks, all I had was the olive wood I purchased (from PSI as well!). Then I took a long look in the 40 gallon trashcan I use as a "to-burn" scrap bin. I found pieces of cherry, walnut, maple burl, ambrosia maple, Osage orange, hickory, and sycamore. While all of these hand been sorted through for scraps suitable in size for pen blanks, I hadn't thought of bottle stoppers. After some work with the bandsaw, I ended up with about (30) assorted 2" sq x 3" long blanks. Not too shabby eh?
Thanks for viewing.
See ya around,
Dominic