[bhurts]

I recently decided to try plotting with a pen. I wanted repeatable results and fairly good clarity. This required a spring loaded pen. I have a bunch of pilot g2 pens laying around and thought it was a good start. After looking at it for a few minutes I realized I didn't need to make anything just do some rearranging. To use it you will need a 10mm collet or it will work as a tight fit in a 3/8 collet. The pics will hopefully be easy to follow.
And then some photos of what I drew with the pen. Note that I ran the same program 5 times for the toxic waste sign at 50,75,100,150, and 200ipm and you can't tell it was drawn more then one time. Here goes. Any questions or confusion just ask.

[bhurts]

I should say thanks to carveone for the Mayan calendar dxf. Thanks for putting it up on your site. Hope all is well.

Ben

[kennected]

Hey Ben,

I really like what you've done. I think plotting with pen is under-rated and doesn't seem to get much press here. I made a spring loaded holder for a bic that worked quite well and was VERY repeatable! I like your choice of pen cartridge better. I have a few sealed plotter pens from the day when all architects used a pen plotter to draw their work. If you PM me with your address, I'll send you a few and you can see how to like them. I think I have some felt tip, roller ball, and others. As commercial plotter pens, they were made for ripping through the plot very fast with little degradation, skipping, or blots.
I too was amazed at how repeatable and accurate my homebuilt machine did with it. That was all I needed to know that I had something worth finishing.

Ken

[Anniepoo]

In college in the 1980's I had a job as a computer operator for the Kansas Geological Survey, which did maps for many states in the midwest.

They had an amazing ultra high speed plotter - used a 2D 'Sawyer' linear motor to move a penholder while suspended on an air bearing from a ground glass surface.
The thing did something like 280 G's acceleration and max speed of several hundred MPH - completely crazy machine.

Amazingly, it used ordinary ball point pen refills. Bic something - but the common plastic tube full of ink with metal nub. The only time it'd skip was if the pen ran out of ink.
Before starting jobs I'd check the file size, and change all the pens on the big ones.