Shopsmith Forums

Hi guys... I have this vision that I need your help with. I know it can be accomplished because I have seen kits for sale to make a barber pole pen in red white and blue. However I am not much of a kit person and would prefer to make my own blanks for this.

I would like to end up with a pen blank of two contrasting woods (one dark and one light) where the pattern equally spirals around the pen...

I simply can't wrap my head around the geometry needed to make this happen. Could someone please offer some guidance on how to assemble a pen blank to produce the desired effect? Thanks in advance for all of your help!

Barber Pole by EagleTa2, on Flickr

I'm thinking that this example is made of a light colored wood like maple and then the design is drawn on the blank and colored with magic markers. If you look at the outline of the design, you can see that it is irregular, suggesting that a fine-point marker was used to apply the black lines.

On the other hand, if this pen actually is assembled from individual wood components, I'd expect the parts were cut with a laser from tubes of wood, resulting in spirals that you could sort of screw back together. Since a laser burns the wood, you'd get those black lines between the spirals.

I'd guess you could do all of this by hand, laying out the spirals on wood tubes similar to how "barley twist" spirals are laid out for turning. Then saw along the layout lines. Then screw the spirals together, but you'd need a really high degree of accuracy to pull it off.

I don't think it can be done by simply slicing the pen blank and replacing the kerf with thin strips of wood as is done when making celtic knots.

Barber Pole Pen kit from Kallenshan woods and look in the laser cut pen kit area at the bottom of the page
http://WWW.Kallenshaanwoods.com I know that you would rather do it yourself but you have to mount the pen blank on the lathe and then use something like an Exacto knife to cut the spirals and then die the pieces and then reassemble them over the brass tube. I suppose a small coping saw could also be used for cutting but that would REALLY BE time consuming.
Bill V

and remember that there are four stripes not three. there are two white stripes.

Fergit the flag! He wants two contrasting stripes from two different species.


Four strips glued in a spiral twist. It will have to be stressed or steamed to get it to that shape.

May be too stressful to survive turning.

After looking at the barber pole pen kits and seeing the limited description of what is required to put the kit together, I'm still believing that these are made from wooden tubes that are then cut with a laser to produce the spirals. The colored spirals are dyed box elder. When you get the kit, you twist or screw them back into position. A brass tube is then glued inside the spirals, mounted on a lathe mandrill and cleaned up.

Pennview;
Correctomundo;
Like these?
[ATTACH]17995[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]17996[/ATTACH]

Bill V

Here's is how I think these barber pole kits are made:

- bore a wooden blank through and then turn it round between centers to made a wooden tube.

- mount the tube on something like a metal lathe for cutting threads. Instead of threads per inch, you're dealing with a pitch of something like multiple inches per thread. I expect that the guy doing these uses a CNC lathe/laser machine where the laser and rotation of the tube are synchronized (similar to how you cut threads). Instead of using a tool bit to cut "threads," he uses a laser to cut a thread-like pattern or spiral through the blank.

- alternatively, I'd expect you could make these on something like Beall's Pen Wizard provided you could offset the Dremel cutter accurately for subsequent passes. Other possibilities are the Craftsman Router-Crafter or a Legacy Ornamental Mill. Or, you could do it by hand if you have the patients.

I have a bunch of scraps left over from when I cut my 3/4 " blocks down to 1/2 " before drilling holes and turning and was wondering if anybody has glued 1/4 " leftovers together to make interesting looking pens.

How about laminating contrasting color woods, about 1/4" x 1/2" and several inches long and a sufficient width to be able to cut the wood on the diagonal in a width sufficient to turn to the desired diameter. The width could keep repeating the desired colors (red, white or red, white and blue). I vaguely remember this from many years ago when I was doing some turning.