What’s the hardest and easiest pens you’ve cleaned

Brothers of Briar

Help Support Brothers of Briar:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

eggman

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 22, 2007
Messages
1,487
Reaction score
166
I was sitting here yesterday morning and noticed that I had 5 pens that needed to be cleaned out.

1. Conklin duragraph
2. Pilot metropolitan med. nib
3. Pilot metropolitan fine nib
4. Lamy Safari
5. Shaffer’s snorkel 14kt fine nib 1950’s era I believe

The Shaffer only holds enough ink to write for a minute or so. The bladder is pretty hard so it doesn’t suck up much ink. So it cleaned up very quickly.

I was very surprised how quickly the Conklin cleaned up. It didn’t take but a couple minutes and water was flowing clear through it. It is a wet writing pen so maybe that helped some, letting the water pass through it so quickly.

I’ve always had decent luck with my Lamy’s cleaning up somewhat easily. It just depends on the ink with them too. If I use Shaffer black, my wife likes that color in the lamy she “borrows” from me. It can be a living hell to clean out. But most other inks come clean pretty easily after a few minutes.

Now the pilot metropolitans, that’s another story. For some reason they always take longer to clean up than any other pen I have. Now it’s not like it’s takes a hour or anything of the like. But it does take a little more time for me to make sure all the old ink is out. For some reason the feed in those pen hold a ton of ink and they just don’t want to let it go. One of them took almost 10 minutes to clean before all the California teal was gone.

After cleaning, drying and putting away those I inked up to fresh ones. A pilot vanishing point med nib and a Jinhuo X450 that I received in the bombing run in January. Now that 450 is an awesome writing pen. My wife tried it and absolutely loves it. She said she wished it had a black in it because she would like to borrow it. That’s the reason I inked it up with robert oyster fire and ice.



 
One of my “hardest” is my Lamy 2000. It’s not all that tough, just more than others cause the ink reservoir is not easily accessible and I end up having to run water, etc. in and out via the fill twister knob.  Slow.  Oddly enough though, it’s my favorite pen.  Awesome timeless Bauhaus design.  Great feel, great writer, tough as a tank.  

All my vac filler pens and the cartridge/converter models are about the same to clean...that being no big deal.

I have one of those blue rubber squeeze bulb things that I can jam into the section and force feed water, cleaning sol’n etc. through under significant flow.  It’s a godsend.  Pen Flush Solution also really helps.
 
PS:  eggman wrote...

 “Now that 450 is an awesome writing pen. My wife tried it and absolutely loves it. She said she wished it had a black in it because she would like to borrow it. That’s the reason I inked it up with robert oyster fire and ice.”


Wow!  Be careful what you disclose. lol
 
Parker DuFold's seem to be the hardest for me to get fully clean. Not surprising really. Button fillers with a sac. A good pen flush helps to get that last bit of residue dissolved.

Of course, I realized I have not touched one, in a very long time. I like wartime Parkers. But they never seem to have those slick nibs like Pelikan's have.
 
Blackhorse":stgruv17 said:
PS:  eggman wrote...

 “Now that 450 is an awesome writing pen. My wife tried it and absolutely loves it. She said she wished it had a black in it because she would like to borrow it. That’s the reason I inked it up with robert oyster fire and ice.”


Wow!  Be careful what you disclose.  lol
Well just about everything usually comes back to bite me on the butt anyway. So I’ll just make it easier for anybody that looking for a reason :lol!:

But seriously though that pen is awesome. It writes very smooth.
 
Carlos":27o0eu68 said:
Parker DuFold's seem to be the hardest for me to get fully clean.  Not surprising really.  Button fillers with a sac.  A good pen flush helps to get that last bit of residue dissolved.

Of course, I realized I have not touched one, in a very long time.  I like wartime Parkers.  But they never seem to have those slick nibs like Pelikan's have.  
I have never written with a Parker fountain pen. I had a ball point or roller ball several years back. But no idea what ever happened to it.

I’ve looked at the Parkers and pelikans on eBay. But never pulled the trigger on one because I know nothing about them and which ones are good and which ones to stray away from.

That’s why I will pick up a Shaffer if I see one locally that’s cheap. I’ve had a couple of those and the ones that worked have been great smooth writers. I have 2 Shaffer’s I want to get fixed. One I picked up for $10 and a antique/junk dealer. And the other one belongs to my wife. It was her grandmothers pen. I’m thinking about surprising her and getting working so she can use it. She told me used to use it back in the mid 60’s when her grandmother was still alive.
 
Sheaffer school pens were the introduction that many had to the world of fountain pens. Cartridge filled with steel nibs. Surprisingly tough. They made better pens of course.

There is something about the plastic of the 1930's and 1940's that feels good in the hand. Often a celluloid. One type burns easily. The Parker's had very interesting pens at the time. Often the clip was gold plated and silver filled.

Sheaffer's of that period also had nice plastic. Triumph nibs that could write through multiple layers of paper and carbon to make good copies. Military clips, so as to not mess up the uniform and still have a pen in the pocket. And the snorkel that could suck that last drop of ink from a bottle.
 
Carlos":4p92c0i5 said:
Sheaffer school pens were the introduction that many had to the world of fountain pens.  Cartridge filled with steel nibs.  Surprisingly tough.  They made better pens of course.  

There is something about the plastic of the 1930's and 1940's that feels good in the hand.  Often a celluloid.  One type burns easily.  The Parker's had very interesting pens at the time.  Often the clip was gold plated and silver filled.

Sheaffer's of that period also had nice plastic.  Triumph nibs that could write through multiple layers of paper and carbon to make good copies.  Military clips, so as to not mess up the uniform and still have a pen in the pocket.  And the snorkel that could suck that last drop of ink from a bottle.  
I have a snorkel pen. The sac is pretty much hard. It will suck up enough ink to write a sentence or 2 but that’s about it. But what little bit it does write it smooth as silk. It does have a 14kt fine nib.
 
Top