pipemakersforum.com

Hi everyone,

I've just been cutting integral tenons for the last 6 months or so, but wanted to give delrin another try on the stem I was working on today. However, when I was done I noticed a hair's width of a light gap between one edge of the stem and the shank face. The only thing that I can think of that could be causing it is that my delrin is slightly bent--in fact, none of the delrin rods I have are perfectly straight.

I didn't think that this slight bend in the rod would make any significant difference over the 1" or so length of the cut piece of delrin for the tenon, but apparently it does. Has anyone else had this problem? Is there a certain supplier whose delrin rods are straight? (fwiw I tried a heat gun on some of the slightly bent delrin to see if it would go back to straight like ebonite can, but unfortunately it has no memory)

Thanks!

delrin is very pliable, and a short piece should not effect the seating of a stem to a shank. drill and face a piece of scrap briar, insert the stem into that and see if it is still off.

There is a good chance that it is the gluing process and not the delrin itself. We recently had a discussion about that, and a suggestion from staffwalker solved this very issue for me. The name of the topic was "more recent efforts." Can't figure out how to link that at the moment since it comes up in a frame ...

Tis here:

viewtopic.php?f=18&t=4537

Hmm, I didn't think of that being a problem since the fit of the delrin to the stem mortise was so tight I needed a mallet to sit it. I'll give it a shot though.

Thanks guys.

Mallet or not, there's still loads of chance of it being off center, let me tell you!