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An Old Friend

I've had the same bench pin since I began making Jewelry back in 2005. A bench pin is what you use to saw on with your jewelry saw. It's basically a piece of wood used to support your work. In my metals studio class we were told you can buy one at a jewelry supply shop for around $15, but seeing how at that time I had no money I just cut off a board from a pallet I found in the alley. I've been using that piece of wood for all these years now. Pretty much every thing I have ever made, using my saw at least, has been cut on this bench pin. There is a lot of history there, but it's starting to wear out.

It first started out looking like a regular bench pin with two fingers coming out where you could have your saw in the middle. About a year ago one of the fingers broke off so I was left with just one, which still worked great. Over the years I have sawed, drilled, and sanded a  lot of the wood away. The edges of this wood use to be strait. I have a feeling that pretty soon the whole thing is just going to fall apart. I have some big plans coming up in a few days and I hope that it last until then, but I'm pretty sure that it will be it's last job that I ask of it. After next Monday I'm going to be retiring this bench pin. Here are some photos of this old friend.

Here is a photo of how it looked a little over a year ago when it still had both it's fingers.

And how it looks today

Hang in there little guy, just a few more days to go.