{"id":908,"date":"2015-04-10T12:35:36","date_gmt":"2015-04-10T16:35:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.woodturningpens.com\/?p=908"},"modified":"2015-04-10T12:35:36","modified_gmt":"2015-04-10T16:35:36","slug":"corian-pen-making-material","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.woodturningpens.com\/corian-pen-making-material\/","title":{"rendered":"Corian as a Pen Making Material"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
I suspect many people, if not most, are familiar with Corian, a proprietary brand of countertop material manufactured by the DuPont Corporation that has been a feature of kitchens and bathrooms worldwide since its introduction in 1971, having first been made in 1967 and patented in 1968. A niche use of this material is in the making of custom pens, a use that many people may not have heard of despite the common knowledge of the material itself.<\/p>\n
Corian is technically described as an acrylic polymer mixed with alumina trihydrate. The alumina, as the name implies, is an aluminium (the spelling used by every country other than the United States and therefore, to my mind, more correct despite the complicity of the IUPAC <\/a>in American obstreperousness) compound most commonly used as an ore for the production of pure aluminium metal. Acrylic polymer is a petroleum derivative that is best described in common terms as a “plastic” despite the potential howls of hardline chemists who would no doubt wish to muddy the waters of commonly understood terms in the pursuit of specificity that won’t mean anything to most of us anyway. In the sense of Corian being an acrylic of any sort, it is similar to the many other brands, descriptions, and formulations of acrylic pen blanks that custom pen makers are likely familiar with and which are commonly available from specialty retailers, although I find Corian to be far less brittle than most of the other “acrylic” pen blanks I have worked with and therefore, to my mind, easier to use.<\/p>\n Corian has the advantage of being available in a rainbow of colors, although few of the colors are actually solid, instead most often being designed to mimic other materials such as various types and colors of stone such as granite or marble, which are also highly desirable countertop materials, but options which come at a much higher price premium than Corian. At last count, Corian is available in over 100 different colorful designs and patterns, making a rich resource for custom pen making, easily rivaling the varieties of woods and even other plastics available to both the professional pen maker and the hobbyist, especially if a stone look is desired.<\/p>\nThe Diversity of Corian<\/h2>\n