My Dip Nibs Won’t Hold Ink

Ken Stout asks: I have picked up two boxes of dip pen nibs. One is from C. Howard Hunt Pen Co. in Camden, NJ. The other box is Bank of England No. 104 Ball Pointed Nickel Aluminum nibs. I cannot get nibs from either box to hold any ink. I dip the nib. Brush off extra ink and the first touch to the paper the ink make a blob, then perhaps writes about three letters and then it’s done. Is there a trick I do not know to using a dip nib?

Steel dip nibs are always, to the best of my knowledge, shipped with a very light coating of oil to keep them from rusting. Ink will roll off them like water off a duck's back. Most users of steel dips are in the habit of sucking on each new nib for a while before using it; if this doesn't pass your reasonableness test, try shaking the nibs gently in a sealed jar containing one tablespoon of clear household ammonia mixed with ²/3 cup of water.

Pelikan Nib Skips — Easy to Fix?

Terry Mahoney asks: Somewhere I heard that Pelikan is out-sourcing their nibs and now they are having a problem with skipping. I recently bought a new Pelikan 400 with a broad nib. It skips when starting unless I use a lot of pressure. I am relatively capable of fixing things. Could you please tell me how to fix this problem.

Unfortunately, the behavior you’re experiencing can occur with any nib and is not the problem that I’ve traced to Pelikan’s recent nibs. The nibs affected by that problem, about which I wrote in an earlier column, are the M800 and M1000. Your pen’s nib could need its tines respaced farther apart, or realigned, or twisted to align the slit walls; or it could need its tip reshaped, as some Pelikan nibs have what I call the “butt cheeks” problem. (See the image to the right.) This problem occurs when the edges of the slit are too rounded; you get great smoothness, but the rounded edges don’t allow the ink to come down to the paper unless you press hard enough to force paper up into the slit. I wish I could give you a silver bullet here, but fixing your nib will require analyzing it to see which of these problems is causing its failure. (Be aware that any given nib can have more than one problem!)

Tightening a “51” Clip

Wes Simpson asks: I found a nice 51 with a gold filled cap. The clip is loose and rotates freely around the cap. I am thinking that there is a screw beneath the “jewel” which can be tightened. I wonder if you can tell me if this is correct and if so, how do I get that darned “jewel” out without ruining it?

You are right in thinking there is a screw under the jewel. As you can see from the image here, the jewel screws into a brass bushing that screws, in turn, into the inner cap. Before you start trying to remove anything, wrap cellophane tape around the cap, sliding it under the clip ball, to keep the clip ball from scoring a groove or bright strip in the cap’s finish.

To remove the jewel, use a square of very firm rubber about 1" square and about 1/8" thick. With the ball of your thumb, press the rubber against the jewel and turn with a sharp counterclockwise motion. The jewel may come loose so that you can screw it out. But it probably won’t; these babies can be very temperamental. You can try soaking, ultrasonic cleaning, and heat to loosen the jewel. All of these methods are likely to require patience, so be prepared to sit in for the long haul. Heat will be required if the jewel is still secured as it was from the factory, by shellac. Be careful how much heat you apply, because the jewel is celluloid, not acrylic, and it will begin to soften at about 165° F. (Shellac softens at about 140° F.)

Sometimes the jewel brings the brass bushing with it. If this happens, grasp the bushing endwise using serrated-jaw needlenose pliers and heat the bushing, turning it around as you do, so that the heat will reach all sides. Try to keep the jewel itself out of the heat. Try every half minute or so to unscrew the jewel. it may come a little bit at a time, requiring several heatings.

Once you have the jewel out, you can use a wire brush to clean shellac residue from its threads. Cleaning shellac out of the brass bushing will require a dental pick and patience.

You can now screw the brass bushing in tightly. (If the inner cap turns freely, put the cap on the pen so that friction with the hood will keep the inner cap from turning.) Be careful to check whether your pen has a Split Arrow clip or a plain Arrow clip. If it has a plain Arrow, then there is probably a raised “tab” that fits under the clip to keep it from turning when the brass bushing is tight. After the bushing is tight, screw the jewel back in. Usually, seating the jewel with a firm twist of the rubber square will keep it in place nicely. Shellac it if you must.