I certainly noticed that Bloodwood is extremely dense and hard, so I was quite cautious when drilling the center bores for the pens. Slow advance and regular retreats to remove debris is key when drilling any dense wood.
Personally, I prefer to turn really hard woods on the lathe because it is usually simple to achieve a very nice cut and finish without the need for a great deal of sanding as happens with softer woods. With Bloodwood, the cut was extremely fine and I didn’t really need any sanding at all to speak of and probably did it more out of habit than out of need.
For a finish I chose to apply cyanoacrylate because that is my go-to choice for a high gloss and durable finish on a pen that needs to withstand frequent handling and being tossed in a drawer and/or a purse. The plus to using cyanoacrylate on Bloodwood is that it greatly intensifies that deep red color of the wood which leaves it quite beautiful indeed.
I enjoyed my repeated experiences with Bloodwood and I look forward to using it again in the future for more desk tools as well as in larger applications.
As always, I wish all my readers a great experience in whatever their wood working interests happen to be and to those who like working with lathes especially, do a good turn today!