Slim line case for Mont Blanc 149

I don’t go out of my way to make my cases huge but I have never tried to make a slim line case so here goes.

I decided to start with some simple drawings, I did say simple.

Including the pen

After posting pictures on FPN a member named Zaddick who has a number of my cases gave me some feedback about the shape of the case. Taking this on board I altered the shape slightly and made it less angular.

Now that I have a shape I am happy with on paper I started to make the plywood laminate.  I picked three pieces of plywood which were glued and clamped together this gave the required thickness.

I transferred the markings from the card to the plywood and cut out the blank.

Trying to replicate the paper shape in wood is not as easy as it looks but I got there in the end.

After lots of sanding I was finally ready to make a test pressing.

There were some pencil marks on the underside of the mould which transferred to the hot Kydex as the two pieces of the mould were brought together.

After trimming I was left with a simple shell to protect the pen.

The next step was to wrap the Kydex shell in some suede as I had emerald green handy that is what I used.

Green is not the only colour and yes Laura at Fountain Pen Follies a slick leather might well look very good. Please tell me what you think.

Here are the two inner sections side by side,

Forming the outer leather covers this is 2mm shoulder.

Applying the leather dye to the still wet leather. The back and front flap piece was also soaked and dyed wet. Dry leather absorbs dye differently to wet leather which could mean the finished colour would be different.

Bringing the pieces together with glue.

The next step was to bring the pieces together initially I used glue which secured the pieces together while I marked out the stitching holes. I made a template in card to assist with the upper flap.

Ready for stitching

After stitching I marked out the sides and cut them.

For the black and yellow case I decided to use black thread but I added a little yellow thread detail on the strap using a fine Lin Cable 532 thread, The black thread is Lin Cable 332.

Time to trim the edges on the black and yellow case and finish the edges.

Unfortunately there are one or two issues with these cases

On both cases the thinner leather allows a lot of movement in the flap which makes it more difficult to pass it through the strap.

The yellow nappa leather has absorbed some of the edge dye and actually appears to be picking up black dye in many places.

My original plan was to offer these cases for sale once completed, however although they work as cases they are not up to the standard of work that I allow to leave my workshop.

I will use them for transporting my own M B 149 s when they are not in the 3 pen case shown in the picture above.

I can still make slim line cases but will use slightly thicker leather that I use for my other cases.

Thanks for reading

Michael

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