Strange metals

[DavidB]

I've had a crazy fascination with custom pens, but not just any old custom pen (music nib, gold highlights, fancy finishes, etc..). I've wanted a custom pen, perhaps an eyedropper, made from strange metals.

 

Tungsten (just as dense as gold)

Uranium (-more- dense than gold)

and my favorite:

Titanium

 

Does anyone know if it is possible to custom machine metal blanks to accept a nib and feed section scavenged from another pen?

 

How can I find these special people, if not here?

 

Is it even legal to own depleted uranium?

 

DavidB

[gregamckinney]

The one person who comes to mind in this area is Chris Thompson. He has offered Duofold replicas in Copper, Titanium and many other unusual materials.

http://thompsonpens.com/

 

I know that Fultz worked with metal pens, but I'm not sure if he went beyond Sterling and (maybe) stainless steel.

 

Regards, greg

[MYU]

I remember a guy at a pen show who had some interesting pens made out of lathe turned metals. It wasn't Thompson... but unfortunately I can't remember his name. Maybe one of the veterans might know who I'm talking about.

 

Uh.... uranium? I wouldn't dare have a pen made out of that. The term "half-life" means there's always some radiation. Even a minuscule amount is not something to trifle with!

[skipwilliams]

I once owned one of Chris Thompson's solid Titanium Duofold replicas. The pen handled nice, but was too heavy for any pocket that I owned and never got carried. It was very heavy in practice. Much like a Lominchay solid Sterling Silver pen.

 

Chris also has made pens milled from solid bronze, aluminum, or copper. I think the copper one is the heaviest. See Stylophiles for an old review.

 

Bruce Boone (boonerings.com) makes solid titanium and zirconium pens, but those are $7-800 and up. Not cheap. Grayson Tighe also makes titanium pens......also super expensive.

 

I don't know if tungsten is machinable, I'm sure Bruce could tell you.

 

Depleted Uranium is a controlled substance and not available to the general public. It's radioactive, 60% as much as natural Uranium. Not something to be trifled with.

 

Skip

 

 

I've had a crazy fascination with custom pens, but not just any old custom pen (music nib, gold highlights, fancy finishes, etc..). I've wanted a custom pen, perhaps an eyedropper, made from strange metals.

 

Tungsten (just as dense as gold)

Uranium (-more- dense than gold)

and my favorite:

Titanium

 

Does anyone know if it is possible to custom machine metal blanks to accept a nib and feed section scavenged from another pen?

 

How can I find these special people, if not here?

 

Is it even legal to own depleted uranium?

 

DavidB

 

[richardandtracy]

Depleted Uranium is radioactive, but you are irradiated more in a sunny day than from the surface of DU. However, DU is chemically toxic and it corrodes quite badly. The corrosion flakes off, and most of the particulates are small enough to breathe in, which is bad news. In the body, it accumulates just like lead and has more severe poisoning effects than lead, and has the disadvantage of being radioactive too - and when it's in the body the damage is worst, because it accumulates near the marrow so making leukemia most likely. If DU were not radioactive, it'd be a controlled material due to its toxicity.

 

Basically forget DU.

 

I believe Ralph Prather has done Titanium custom P51's. The nib, feed, cap & collector were the only original parts, the rest was made by Ralph. ( http://www.pratherpens.com/Welcome.html ). Ralph is a member of FPN too.

 

Tungsten would have to be sintered - it's too hard to machine at home - and sintering is not a common process for a backyard machinist.

 

If you talk sweetly to any machinist, and hand them a drawing and a blank of the material, they should be able to do what you want. Whether the price is acceptable is another matter.

Alternatively, you could do it with the aid of a lathe after a suitable learning period... However that way lies madness (just look at me for proof).

 

Regards

 

Richard.

 

[Clydesdave]

Here is that machinist.

 

You technically could make a pen body out of tungsten. The threads would have to be ground into the material with special grinding wheels and processes. It would be very expensive, and when you consider the weight of the pen afterward, I'm sure you would consider it prohibitively expensive. (You wouldn't want to write with such a pen, I can almost guarantee you.)

 

Titanium is pretty difficult to machine and although I'm going to make a pen for myself out or some, I wouldn't do it for anyone else.

 

Copper? Not as difficult, but it's still not all that fun to machine.

 

Molybdenum, Tantalum.... now there's a challenge.

 

There is a formula for calculating the machinability of materials. The formula goes something like this:

 

The have taken cold rolled steel (common, run of the mill material) and machined it with varying speeds and feeds and calculated which combination of those and cutters gives the optimum results. (Lots and lots of details omitted here.) Then they arbitrarily assigned those results the value of 100%, making it a standard to measure other materials against. Now, knowing that, you say you can machine steel at 100% efficiency. Then you do the same for other materials and compare them against that steel standard.

 

Titanium is 22%.

Tungsten is not machinable. (You can change it's shape, but not with cutters.)

Inconel is 0.02% !!! (I hate Inconel.)

 

 

[me2cyclops]

 

 

Tungsten is machinable, I made my wedding band from it abrasive machining works quite well (still a pain in the @$$ to put threads in...)

I have seen bits of very thin tungsten tube on feebay.... it just might work

carved tungsten overlay on an ebonite body

[btboone]

I've made rings in tungsten. I could make a pen in it, but it would be an extremely heavy pen though. I've considered one just for that property, but with the stock alone costing several hundred dollars, it was not worth the gamble working on something that far out.

 

I've made a ring out of Inconel and Niobium before as well. The really trick stuff is Beryllium, which is lighter than aluminum, but machining it can release toxic gas, and only a little bit of death will be plenty.

 

Titanium is not too bad to work with when you have the right equipment. I make my living from it.

[DavidB]

This sounds encouraging! I see that uranium is perhaps not the best of materials, but titanium sounds like a real challenge, or copper. Something with a large thin-walled reservoir.

 

I'll make some calls (write some email) and see what turns up.

 

Thanks for all the help!

 

David B

[richardandtracy]

... The really trick stuff is Beryllium, which is lighter than aluminum, but machining it can release toxic gas, and only a little bit of death will be plenty.

...

Also be very careful of 'Beryllium disease', it is utterly debilitating. A toxic dust mask plus full protective clothing & eyemask is the minimum I'd use when working with it.

Monolithic Beryllium is considered non toxic, but the dust can be breathed in, and the surface corrodes quite rapidly when the RH exceeds 30%. Beryllium Oxide is toxic, and flakes off causing health hazards.

 

After what little experience I've had of Beryllium, I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole.

 

Regards

 

Richard.

Edited February 4, 2009 by richardandtracy

[btboone]

I agree. I guess it's the dust when grinding or machining it that really causes the trouble. I felt a bottom bracket of a bicycle made from it. I used to make them in titanium, so I know how lightweight those were, but this felt like plastic!

 

On the other hand, I have a small bar of tungsten (that cost $900) that you could work out with.

[CLewis]

I do metal pens, but not particularly exotic materials. I'm just getting started on going commercial, but there's a bit of a website here:

 

www.celevipens.com

 

Right now I'm working in Aluminum, brass, and my favourite: bronze. I'm going to be starting in on titanium once some new tooling arrives.

 

Cheers,

 

Cameron

 

 

I've had a crazy fascination with custom pens, but not just any old custom pen (music nib, gold highlights, fancy finishes, etc..). I've wanted a custom pen, perhaps an eyedropper, made from strange metals.

 

Tungsten (just as dense as gold)

Uranium (-more- dense than gold)

and my favorite:

Titanium

 

Does anyone know if it is possible to custom machine metal blanks to accept a nib and feed section scavenged from another pen?

 

How can I find these special people, if not here?

 

Is it even legal to own depleted uranium?

 

DavidB

 

[someonesdad]

Molybdenum, Tantalum.... now there's a challenge.

In the 70's, I worked in a group at Varian Associates in Palo Alto designing molecular beam epitaxy systems. We had few materials we could work with -- mainly 304 and 304L stainless, aluminum, molybdenum, tantalum, tungsten, tungsten-rhenium, boron nitride, and a few ceramic materials. We had some machinists in the R&D lab who worked in a small shop with crummy old equipment and these guys figured out how to make the things we designed (we were smart enough to go talk to them first before finishing a design!). This stuff was rigorously cleaned, then the whole system would be baked out at 400 degrees C or a bit more (that's quite a bit hotter than your home oven can go). Those old guys are all dead now. I sure wish I had had the time to go down to the shop and watch them work and learn some of their secrets.

[dsymonds]

As someone who has machined large quantities of depleted uranium I must completely agree with the discussion concerning DU's toxicity. The oxides of DU are chemically toxic to human cell structure. The real issue is that DU is a low specific activity Alpha/Beta emitter. Alpha particles are stopped by the top layer of your skin, a piece of paper or such. Beta particles will penetrate up to the second/third layer or so of skin and through a piece of paper. As such the external exposure risk is very small. The major risk is the oxidation of the surface of the material and the breathing of the dust from the oxidation or from the machining of the material. Unlike Gamma emitting particles, an alpha or beta particle in the lung will not show up on an external scan for radiation in the body. The particle will embed itself in the lung and continue to emit it's particles and irradiate the tissue that immediately surrounds it. Even though it only irradiates a few cells deep, it can eventually cause cell mutation and possible cancer at the site of the contamination. In most cases, once embedded, it will never come back out. Additionally, DU is an exothermic material and will burn with intense heat (like magnesum) if the cuttings are allowed to get hot enough. The smoke from the burning is full of oxides of DU and molecular sized pieces of the material. Exposure and breathing can really make for a bad day indeed.

 

I have also machined a lot of berillum copper. In my experience, it is always machined under a total immersion bath of kerosene to contain the dust and lubricate the cut. Breathing berillum dust is a very bad thing to do. It can cause major problems.

 

For both of the above materials, we always worked in full face respirators and special contamination control garments to protect the lungs and eyes from airborn contamination. Full showers, skin surface radiation checks and skin wipe tests for contamination after working with the materials were absolute requriements.

 

While DU is controlled, it can be obtained from troops coming back from war zones where DU cored shells are fired. It's illegal but that doesn't stop some from bringing back war trophies. Wrapping the DU in a few layers of aluminum foil will generally contain the radiation enough to get past the portal monitors at most stations. Berillum copper is obtainable from many metals supply houses without permit but that still doesn't mean it isn't a harmful substance.

 

I would suggest staying totally away from these materials.

 

Dan

 

 

 

[wykpenguin]

Molybdenum? You are kidding me. You might not be able to afford it.

 

If you had to go through all the not so hazardous metals in the periodic table, you might also consider rhodium, rhenium, iridium, zirconium, neodymium, hafnium, etc. The point being that there are easily 30 stable and hard metals in the periodic table most more expensive than gold.

 

On a more practical side, you could use magnesium. In bulk form it should be hard enough for a thick walled pen and would be very light, doesn't react with water and has quite harmless compounds unlike most heavy metals which have deadly oxides and chlorides. Good luck machining it and not setting it on fire. It could also be a survival tool. A few scrapings from your pen and a match will start a fire for you in no time. Bismuth might also be a nice choice for those who are less ambitious non-toxic and easily available.

[Clydesdave]

Reading all this, and knowing a good deal about these metals myself, I find myself thinking, "There is good reason that things (including pens) are made from the materials they are made from.

 

 

 

[SimonJamesLucas]

I've had a crazy fascination with custom pens, but not just any old custom pen (music nib, gold highlights, fancy finishes, etc..). I've wanted a custom pen, perhaps an eyedropper, made from strange metals.

 

Tungsten (just as dense as gold)

Uranium (-more- dense than gold)

and my favorite:

Titanium

 

Does anyone know if it is possible to custom machine metal blanks to accept a nib and feed section scavenged from another pen?

 

How can I find these special people, if not here?

 

Is it even legal to own depleted uranium?

 

DavidB

 

 

This post is one of the reasons I love this site so much, you mad person you! Have a look at the Sigma Sola by Sigma Pens of England, I haven't tried one of these personally but I think its pretty unique in the market place and rather overshadowed by its more glamorous sister the Style.

[publius]

DU, or natural uranium, or alternatively thorium, would be safe enough if gold-plated (all over, inside & out). A good heavy plate would protect from chemical action, while trapping the dominant alpha radiation, just as it does for atomic bomb parts. Any of them would, however, be the devil to machine, due to pyrophoric tendencies as well as toxicity, & you would have to worry about the plating wearing thin. I just don't see much advantage.

 

Considering the malleability of electrolytic (pure) copper & certain copper alloys, though, I think that could be a very fun choice. There is a lot you could do with drawing & spin-forming from thin sheet or thin-walled tubing, as against machining from a solid block, which would leave you with something resembling a metal balloon. The same possibilities exist with gold, silver, & aluminum alloys, although the last-mentioned have certain practical problems, & you'd be hard put to it to find someone accustomed to working in this way with the first two.

[btboone]

It would definitely be a challenge!

[Dimitri]

To think I thought my current project of a Stainless Steel "coupler" and Red tinted Acrylic pen was a crazy one.

 

Dimitri