In the ever continuing quest to reduce the size of items in our PSKs, I have a question reqarding pencils.<br><br>I have a small, thin pencil that cam with a playing card set that I received as a small gift years ago. It's approximately 1/8 in diameter, which is considerably smaller than the little golf pencils some folks use in their PSKs. I searched the web to find a source for these tiny writting implements, but came up empty. :-(<br><br>I did find one web site about making pencils for kids out of paint stirrer sticks and lead. So I thought this idea could be a way to make smaller pencils for kits. My thought was to use a thin sheet of basswood from the hobby store, use an awl and a straight edge to create parallel groves for the lead, 6the glue and sandwich them with another piece of thin basswood. A sharp razor knife would be used to cut out the separate pencils.<br><br>Any comments on this idea?

I must be missing something here. I've read the similar posts discussing small pencils, where to get them, etc.<br><br>Why not take a regular pencil and saw it off at the desired length? If you want a smaller diameter pencil, then chuck the pencil in your electric drill, turn it on and take some sand paper to it until you acheive the desired diameter. It's not going to take that long to do and you're only going to make a few at most, right?<br><br>Like I said, I must be missing something here. I'm not going to spend a lot of time searching around for just the right pencil when I can easily make exactly what I want in short order and be done with it. So what am I missing folks?<br><br>--Mike Briggs<br> Maryland

Thanks for this. This is just the sort of pratical ideas that I crave. I just didn't think of it. Glad you did! Thanks for posting. <br>Sometimes the obvious is the first thing overlooked.

No big deal.<br><br>I have this ultra thin diameter pencil already and thought I could locate them easily. But I was wrong. When I saw the site on making your own, I thought it would be an interesting way to go about it. And it's a project I can get my children involved with where I would only allow my oldest to turn a pencil in a hand drill.

Sounds like a fun project for the kids.<br><br>Hmmm... If they do good work maybe you could hire out their services to Chris to assemble his PSKs :-)

Having sawed off the pencil at the desired length, you might pack it away in the kit as is, and regard the excess as tinder for a fire, to be whittled as needed.