Welcome, New Guys Come Say hello

Great to see this section. I am new to this BB. I have been collecting and restoring FP's for 10 years I don't know about anyone else but I got into restoring because repairs were getting to be too much. I am still learning to do repairs especially lathe work. Still a bit hit or miss on some of these repairs. Parker's and CS's are my thing.
Cheers. Rob

Well with a post like that you know I'm going to ask, but do you have pictures of your collection?

Welcome to the NIB hope you have some fun with us, and may your coffee table remain ink free

Rsilver said:

Great to see this section. I am new to this BB. I have been collecting and restoring FP's for 10 years I don't know about anyone else but I got into restoring because repairs were getting to be too much. I am still learning to do repairs especially lathe work. Still a bit hit or miss on some of these repairs. Parker's and CS's are my thing.
Cheers. Rob

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Welcome, Rob. I am sure you can lend some knowledge to those of us who have not yet restored a vintage pen.

Ha ha James, u r too good an enabler

My boss, with 4 beautiful watermans took 4 years to inspire me.. i guess am bit slow, Yet, i will not run, but only yield.

Now, getting a Parker jotter for everyday writing..

syngent said:

Well Hariharan, we are certainly good at not enabling people into aquiring new pens to try

on a completely different note, does every pen collection out there need a 78G, Im thinking its high time i brought one into the fold

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Hello to all,
I've been a FP user for well, since college days. But I've had bouts of using ball points and then returning to the Fp!. This current stint has been 3 years and has been my most avid (methinks). I'm primarily a user as my job does require using a pen. I've acquired quite a few (and yes only a few) fps over the years: MBs (149 and 145), Conway Stewarts (vintage and modern) as well as the usual P51's and primarily Indian eyedropper pens but also I've a Pilot M90 and some Japanese eyedropper pens. But in total only about 25 (at last count). I prefer eyedropper pens for their large ink capacity as my job requires a lot of daily writing.

Thanks for the welcome. i'm happy to help if I can with restoration questions. I am pretty good at sac replacement including vacs, nib straightening and section repair. Thread repair is my nemesis especially in caps. As soon as I can figure out how to post pictures, I will bring up a few photos of the "herd" I am always interested in what people are writing with. Personally, I like vintage pens as there is a better selection of soft, flexible nibs which I prefer. Current pens in my pocket are a parker 65 with a broad nib and a Parker VP that I actually milled a new filler unit out of delrin as the old one was a goner as is usually the case with this filler design. I have had several discussions about Parker VP filler repair with Ron Zorn from Main Street Pens at our CNY pen club meetings. It is a vexing repair for anyone. Cheers Rob ( newbie straight razor user for 6 months).

So I don't know if I still count as new to the nib - I've made a couple of posts since Christmas when I first found the place.
My boss got me back into to FP's about 6 months ago, and since then I've acquired a handful of cheap pens. My pride and joy is a Faber Castell Basic which I love very much.

Just after Christmas I spotted a Parker 51 for sale on ebay. The seller had been given it as a gift before going off to fight in WW2 and apparently it had survived being shot down with him in a hurricane over Greece. It had seen him through a lifetime of writing, but was now for sale as his eyesight and shakes made it impossible to write. I was desperate to buy it and give it a loving home, but sadly didn't have the funds at the time. I'll regret that a long time.
So now I'm saving towards a 51. In the meantime, I guess I'll keep writing on bananas:

That would be an interesting pen from the 1940's. in 1941 the year the Parker 51 was introduced, the 51 was fairly expensive. An Heirloom cap (now worth a fortune) in 14k with 14k trim was $50, if it had a sterling cap with 14k trim it was $25, if it was a run of the mill 4 lines alternating GF cap with GF trim ( one of the most common lines) it was $15 and if it was a sterling cap with GF trim it went for $12.50 . Not an insignificant sum in those days. Consider that now that a double jewel GF cap restored 51 is about $150-200, an heirloom 14k starts at out $1200 and up, a fish scale heirloom pattern cap over $2000, and rare colors addd more to the cost.
cheers,
Rob

I first popped into the Nib a little before Christmas 2012 looking for a pen for my wife (ended up with a Sailor 1911 which she loves). I did a bit of pen collecting back in the early 90's, but never got serious about it. This time I think I'm in for good. I've switched to paper time management, and that's my primary outlet for writing. I love it.

So far, I've got a pretty small stable, but I expect I'll be adding more, probably with a vintage focus. I expect I'll get a Schaeffer of sort next - presumably lever fill.

Burgundy Parker 51, gold filled cap, medium nib
Black Parker 51, gold filled cap, fine nib
Black Parker 21, fine nib
Black Parker 21, fine nib - partially operational (very slightly bent tines.. I may use it for repair practice myself).
B&B Franklin Christoph in fine
Pilot Metropolitan - Gold with the solid design on the barrel

My wife has the Sailor 1911 I mentioned, and two Pilot metropolitans.


Inks I've tried: Aurora black, Sailor Jentel Blue, Monteverdi Purple, included cartridges for the FC and Metropolitans.

Finally came to the Nib about a month or two ago, have posted a couple of times and enjoy reading & learning all about pens, paper and ink.

I'm not into collecting (yet!) and out to fully use the two pens I bought last year and have posted here they were a Parker 51 & Vacumatic I purchased from my brother-in-law, an avid pen collector!

So per advice received here, I went to the palmermethod.com and have been diligently practicing what I did in school so very loooooong ago

Mrs. Retiredgene has been writing notes these last few months with those pens and folks have enjoyed getting them. I will be joining her as I have some notes I made through Apple's Print Services with photographic images I took in my travels & in photography hobby. I also have started carrying my FP with note taking paper and have found my note taking, jotting ideas down has actually become legible

Gene

Wow all kinds of new members, lots of collections, interests and backgrounds going on nice to meet those I havent met and good to see some old friends too

Hi, folks!

Came to The Nib about 2 months ago out of curiosity, having not used a fountain pen in many more years than I care to think about. I remember the old cartridge FPs and ink patches on my shirt pockets fondly from the high school days.

I recently bought a Pilot Metropolitan, and I'm waiting with bated (not baited) breath on the delivery from Franklin-Christoph.

Have been wet shaving for many years, since my Army days in fact. Cold water in the helmet, no mirror, and insect repellent for aftershave!

Take care!

Welcome to the NIB Shammer, what did you pick yourself up from franklin Christoph ?

Hey y'all, after reading that fountain pens help with bad handwriting I thought I'd give it a try.
I've tried the Pilot Varsity. I find that if i take my time it does help but once I speed up then I get sloppy again. The main thing though is that it's not the right nib for me. I think I need a fine nib because loops look like blobs lol.
I thought about the 78g because they are cheap enough to get one in the different sizes. The platinum preppy i even cheaper. The pelican peilkano jr seems to be made to correct handwriting.
So that's where I'm at, trying to find out where to start that would work best for me. I wish I was close to a store where I could try some out.

lol pens and bad handwriting are a bit like golf and the clubs, sure better ones can help your game, but not nearly as much as practice !
dont expect miracles, they can very much help, but you have to put a little work in, you dont need to really to sit down and just practice each letter and techniques, but writing more, and slowly to start will help your fast writing too, start a journal or pick up a pen pal, give you an excuse to write more as well as entertain yourself

when all else fails you could write a 1000 word essay on how you love your new pen !, ill need that by monday btw

GG1 said:

Hey y'all, after reading that fountain pens help with bad handwriting I thought I'd give it a try.
I've tried the Pilot Varsity. I find that if i take my time it does help but once I speed up then I get sloppy again. The main thing though is that it's not the right nib for me. I think I need a fine nib because loops look like blobs lol.

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It could be an issue with the ink and/or the paper. Very "wet", free-flowing inks and poor quality cheap paper will tend to feather (spread out) and possibly fill the loops of your letters. Grab a sheet of nice smooth heavy-weight paper and see if you notice a difference.

Alright Syngent, I'll have it on your desk

Snargle said:

It could be an issue with the ink and/or the paper. Very "wet", free-flowing inks and poor quality cheap paper will tend to feather (spread out) and possibly fill the loops of your letters. Grab a sheet of nice smooth heavy-weight paper and see if you notice a difference.

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Very good point. I just used notebook paper knowing that it wasn't the right paper.

I'll say hello! I've had a love affair with fountain pens ever since I went through countless Parker Vectors in high school (I had one borrowed/stolen at least once a month).

i currently have a Parker Reflex (black), Sonnet (deep blue), and Urban (matte black), as well as an Aurora Style (mustard). Unfortunately, they don't see much daily use in my day job as a grease monkey.

great to meet you Fred, at least you like them, all my techs at work think my pens are cute, but covered in what their hand gets covered in all day the bics are perfered to write up their estimates anyway so i think they are just jealous of me

Hi everyone,

Just dropped by to say I wandered over here last week looking for a replacement pen for a ball point I lost. I hadn't ever used a fountain pen so I ordered a few pens to try out and today received a B&B Essential from Franklin-Christoph with Med Stub, Pilot Metropolitan Med, a Pilot 78G Fine and some sample inks.

I have been writing a bit with all three pens today... I see the attraction for fountain pens...apparently I've been missing out on this...really liking the fine point NIB so far and the smoothness of the B&B pen. The B&B pen will be for home use and the 78G will be my work pen to take the place of my lost ball point.

I may have some questions later but it seems to me I need to work on my hand writing skills before I do anything else. Thanks for all the good info!