# Wacky Schmidt SKM-88 Idea



## budnder (Jan 2, 2020)

This definitely falls into the territory of the old joke..."Can you tell me how to get to ________ from here?.... and the reply after a considered pause... Well, I wouldn't start from here."  So, yes, I know this is going to way too much effort when another click mechanism would be more to my tastes. But it's a fun brainstorming exercise.

@magpens and I have talked a few times about how concealing some of the lower tier would help the look of the mechanism atop a pen. So I got to thinking about how you could encase the whole lower mechanism. I've been also anyway that a way to combat the spindly appearance (eye of the beholder, i know...) of these long body clickers would to have a decorative center band to break up the length. To assemble the pen, you first glue a "clicker tomb dome" onto the top. Then you screw the SKM88 onto the top of an insert "tube" that you then insert into the bottom of the upper body. The insert tube threads into the dome you glued in place. That insert tube provides the center decorative center band and could be glued or threaded into the lower body.

It would be a fat pen - I measured this design to be 0.7" at the center girth of the wood on the upper body.

Here's a couple of pics (I'm just showing the upper body):


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## magpens (Jan 3, 2020)

@budnder

I think that 0.7" is too fat. . I am not quite understanding the text description above. . And in the diagram, it is not clear to me if there are threads between the light green portion and the light purple portion; ... if so, that might be the cause of the excessive thickness.

To save you searching for my previous work on this topic, here is a reference to it.

Some time ago, I showed a pen that I made using a Berea "Blade" pen kit ( also uses the SKM-88 ). . That pen is not especially beautiful but I think that it could be improved.

In a "crude attempt" to shroud the troublesome length of the click mechanism I made a wooden cap, conceptually a similar idea to the above.
The resulting pen measures only 0.538" in diameter at its widest.

Here is a link to my report of that "crude attempt" with photos of the resulting pen, both with and without the wooden cap:





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						The New Berea Blade Pen Kit - Follow-Up On Prev. Post
					

A few weeks ago a thread titled "Simple High Quality Kits" appeared. .  In that thread I made some posts about the newly introduced Blade pen kit now offered by Berea. This kit makes use of the SKM-88 clicker mechanism made by Schmidt. . The SKM-88 is also used in a previously introduced new pen...



					www.penturners.org


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## budnder (Jan 3, 2020)

Yes, i was thinking threads between the green and blue/purple, so the top of that green "insert tube" has inner threads for the SKM and outer threads to mate with the dome. With those four layers in that one point (SKM + "insert tube" + dome + body)... yes, I think that's driving the thickness. 

I remember your wooden cap, but was thinking that it was just a visual mock up... was it functional (e.g. some way of affixing it)? I guess you could just glue it in place, though I was thinking I'd want to be able to preserve the ability to remove the clicker.

Using the colors as reference... the purple part (dome) is glued to the yellow part(wood). The pink SKM is screwed into the green insert tube. The SKM/insert tube assembly is then inserted into the yellow body (from below) and screws into the purple dome.

I'm not all that serious about trying this, although it might be kinda fun just as a challenge.


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## John Eldeen (Jan 3, 2020)

Have you considered starting your design using a SKM 192 mechanism rather than the SKM 88 mechanism. The SKM 192 is the mechanism used in psi everyday classic. It is a considerably smaller mechanism with the same reliability as the SKM 88. When I can get some time to play around the SKM 192 is what I am planning to try and make a design around.


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## budnder (Jan 3, 2020)

John Eldeen said:


> Have you considered starting your design using a SKM 192 mechanism rather than the SKM 88 mechanism. The SKM 192 is the mechanism used in psi everyday classic. It is a considerably smaller mechanism with the same reliability as the SKM 88. When I can get some time to play around the SKM 192 is what I am planning to try and make a design around.


I think those would be a better place to start from.


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