05/21/2026
I’ve been playing. I have a vendor that sends me a short blank every time I order from them. The blanks are usually acrylic and nothing I would normally use. Many of them are almost clear with color swirls. I could never figure out how these could be used since there has to be a whole drilled through it and a brass tube inserted. You would clearly see the tube. Even if it was painted. Hmmm.
While using a couple of the opaque blanks the other day it hit me. The Everlasting Pencils only need a very small piece of tube to hold the clip/eraser housing and a small section that holds the pencil tip. So I used a piece of blue swirl and drilled a small hole in each end and glued in a small bit of brass tube painted blue. The main portion was clear, but the area with the tube was not what I wanted. Failure number 1.
Ok, how to hide that hole? Got it. Segment the blank with wood on each end with the tube in the wood. I used epoxy to glue the wood pieces to the end of the blank and let it cure overnight. While shaping the blank one of the wood pieces popped off. I tried several times to re-glue, but could never get the glue to hold. There was not enough surface area and could not get it aligned. Failure number 2.
After a bit more thought I came up with a plan. Turn a small tenon on each end of the acrylic and glue the wooden end caps (already drilled) over the tenon and flush with the acrylic body. This would add the needed stability to the blank. SUCCESS!!!
You can’t see the transparency of the bodies in the picture, but they turned out great. With the process defined, a box full of clear blanks, and a container full of old wood cutoffs, look for more of these. (If these sell.)
