What do you use to cut pen blanks & tubes?

[ernie garcia]

Hi,
A new turner here. For my first pens I bought a "starter" kit with pre-drilled & pre-cut blanks & tubes.
What do I need to cut my own blanks & tubes?
I have a table-saw, & chop saw. But those blanks & tubes are awfully small to be cutting.
ernie

 

[Bill Turpin]

Pen kits tubes come pre cut

Tubes come pre-cut. I made a jig for cutting blanks to length on my chop saw. It has toggle clamps to hold both sides of the cut. Let the blade stop before raising it up. This reduces strain on the clamps and movement errors. It is out of 3/4" plywood and is held together on the front edge where it is not cut. The backstop is pre cut and is low enough to miss the blade and saw motor.

 

[Bill Boehme]

Most of the time, a tube does not need to be cut, but if it does, I use a skew chisel and gently use the long point down to score and cut the brass.

 

[jack richington]

Do you have a mitre box?..that works well and won't eat your fingers..heck you can use a handsaw. Clamp the wood to your bench & cut it off with your handsaw. You are going to have to sand the ends square (or use something to square the ends anyway), so how it's cut is not real important

 

[hockenbery]

I use a sled on a bandsaw.
a similar plywood sled on the table saw would work well too

this is made from a square of good plywood.

I screw and glue a strip of wood on for the miter track

another strip of wood is glued on for the fence.
on such a short run I don't worry about a blade track adjustment.

and since i"ll use a barrel trimmer super accuracy is not needed.
I have marked distance for several pen kits on the sled.

in the rare case where I have cut the brass, I do it on the bandsaw.
I have areas on the sled to stack uncut and cut parts

happy turning,
Al

 

[ernie garcia]

Thanks for all the help.

Thanks all.
I guess I'm off to buy/make a jig for my mitre saw.
ernie