Do you use a fountain pen?

[C&C]

My niece recently went on a wonderful 2 week holiday to Japan with a friend from work, which was mainly prompted by them managing to get tickets to 3 matches in the Rugby World Cup.

She asked if there was anything I’d like her to bring back, so given that the latest Canon full frame DSLR was going to be a bit out of budget, I surprised her by coming up with the idea of a bottle of fountain pen ink (I don’t think she’d associated Japan with fountain pens really).

I gave her a couple of ideas, but said that if she wasn’t able to find anything not to worry, as I didn’t want her going out of her way.

Well, not only did she manage to pick up a couple of bottles, but had some fun finding them - particularly the Kingdom Note store, which was apparently on the 3rd floor of a slightly dodgy looking building that bore no resemblance to a shop!

I really like both inks - especially the Kingdom Note brown, and have them both in a pair of (surprise) Parker 51 Aerometrics.

Pics below, with an attempt at a still life photo with a recent watch playing with off-camera flash.

3O2A1382 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

3O2A1387 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

3O2A1407 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Untitled by conradsphotos, on Flickr


Unfortunately, this has led me to look at eBay again, and I seem to have more pens incoming.
The eBay pictures are not the best, but assuming ok condition, they were pretty good value:

Parker 51 Aerometrics (x2) both broad nibs, one a “normal” black with Lustralloy cap, the other a less usual Burgundy with rolled gold cap, but the latest model with the angled, rather than curved end to the body. Both as a single bid for £67

51s by conradsphotos, on Flickr


Also a brown striped Vacumatic which looks in pretty good condition, for £38

vacu by conradsphotos, on Flickr

vacu2 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

[Robbo 27]

Very nice find on the 51s, the nibs on their own are worth the purchase price. I am sure that in 30 years time people will still be collecting Parker 51s over any other brand/model

The Parker Vacumatic looks to be a 1947 and in good order, lets hope that it fills and writes as it should.

[C&C]

Robbo 27 said:

Very nice find on the 51s, the nibs on their own are worth the purchase price. I am sure that in 30 years time people will still be collecting Parker 51s over any other brand/model

They will if I haven't bought them all by then!!

Robbo 27 said:

The Parker Vacumatic looks to be a 1947

Out of interest, how do you know it's likely a 1947 model?
I know that the blind cap became rounded and lost the jewel apparently in the final redesign in 1942 that also saw the introduction of the plastic plunger (due to metal being needed for the war).
So that dates it to post 1942 and pre 1948 when they were phased out in the USA (or 1953 in Canada).

I'm really interested in the 1947 date, and in particular any further websites you could point me to to learn more about them (my main source of reference on general Parkers has been ParkerPens APIS)?

Robbo 27 said:

and in good order, lets hope that it fills and writes as it should.

Hopefully yes - nib should be ok, it's just the filling that's the potential issue. If there's a problem with it, it might be time for me to finally take on a proper refurb of a vacumatic. Been putting it off until now, limited so far to only replacing/installing a new breather tube.

If I end up refurbing it, I'll be sure to post some pics on here. I know I need a few specialised tools from the likes of Laurence Oldfield ( Penpractice), or The Pendragons.
Fortunately I've already got Dr Oldfield's excellent book Pen Repair which has a section on Vacumatics.

[Robbo 27]

CandC said:

Robbo 27 said:

Very nice find on the 51s, the nibs on their own are worth the purchase price. I am sure that in 30 years time people will still be collecting Parker 51s over any other brand/model

They will if I haven't bought them all by then!!

Robbo 27 said:

The Parker Vacumatic looks to be a 1947

Out of interest, how do you know it's likely a 1947 model?
I know that the blind cap became rounded and lost the jewel apparently in the final redesign in 1942 that also saw the introduction of the plastic plunger (due to metal being needed for the war).
So that dates it to post 1942 and pre 1948 when they were phased out in the USA (or 1953 in Canada).

I'm really interested in the 1947 date, and in particular any further websites you could point me to to learn more about them (my main source of reference on general Parkers has been ParkerPens APIS)?

Robbo 27 said:

and in good order, lets hope that it fills and writes as it should.

Hopefully yes - nib should be ok, it's just the filling that's the potential issue. If there's a problem with it, it might be time for me to finally take on a proper refurb of a vacumatic. Been putting it off until now, limited so far to only replacing/installing a new breather tube.

If I end up refurbing it, I'll be sure to post some pics on here. I know I need a few specialised tools from the likes of Laurence Oldfield ( Penpractice), or The Pendragons.
Fortunately I've already got Dr Oldfield's excellent book Pen Repair which has a section on Vacumatics.

As you know the Vac is a Series 3, they sold in very large numbers, possibly because Parker targetted overseas US military personnel in their Christmas advertisements, you paid for the pen in the US and a pen or pen set was collected from an overseas army base, gift wrapped, even with a 2 pen leather pouch embossed with 'On Active Service'.

You are spot on with the dates, although I once saw a 1958 stamped pen. I suspect that in 1958 someone sent a broken barrel back to Parker for a repair and they stamped it up.

I have a Parker Vacumatic that my father used whilst he was on a bus to the Festival of Britain in 1951, he was writing with the pen and dropped it, nib first. Whilst he was at the festival he went to the Parker stand and asked them to fix it, they replaced the nib with a Duofold nib, no charge. He stood looking at the other pens on display and bought his first Parker 51, which looked so very different from any other pen that was available, he put the Vac away and used a 51 for the rest of his life having a new one for Christmas as a rule. The staff saw him counting out his change to pay for the 51 and realised that he had very little money left, they asked if he had enough to pay for his lunch, when he said no they invited him back to have sandwiches and a cup of tea with them, he became a lifelong Parker fan after that.


I still have his Parker Vacumatic, same colour and size as yours.

The reason why 1947 is a reasonably safe guess is because the sales of these pens was huge in 46 and 47, but the big giveaway is the 7 on the nib.The 7 is just visible on the nib. Its possible that the nib date is different to the barrel but not usual.

With any luck the diaphragm will be good on your pen, the test is to remove the blind cap, blow down it and if you can blow past the diaphragm then you know its bad. I am not one to repair Vacs and usually send them away, the specialists repair them every day and Vacs can be difficult to open, also the breather tube has its problems and I have see some bodged repairs on the plunger, for £20 I will leave it to someone else.

In terms of reference books I have the Vacumatic book by David Shepherd, this reference book is getting really hard to find now, when I am old and gummy I will put these reference books on here for those that want them.

One of the best sites for information used to be Richard Binders but it seems to be taken down now, which is a great pity.



One curious pen that has come out in recent years is a copy of the Parker 51 using a Vacumatic filling system,





and some others with very fancy designs

[Clockwork Cupcake]

Robbo 27 said:

The staff saw him counting out his change to pay for the 51 and realised that he had very little money left, they asked if he had enough to pay for his lunch, when he said no they invited him back to have sandwiches and a cup of tea with them, he became a lifelong Parker fan after that.

Wouldn't happen today, sadly. Very few companies still have a concept of customer loyalty and customer retention.

[C&C]

Robbo 27 said:

The reason why 1947 is a reasonably safe guess is because the sales of these pens was huge in 46 and 47, but the big giveaway is the 7 on the nib.The 7 is just visible on the nib. Its possible that the nib date is different to the barrel but not usual.

Ok - thanks for that - really helpful.

Another Mark 3 Vac I have has a different cap band (single wide rather than 2 thin bands), and a different nib:

vac_together by conradsphotos, on Flickr

vac_nib_and_breather by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Again, not sure on the significance of this, apart from the fact the nib doesn't appear to be marked with a year number.

Robbo 27 said:

With any luck the diaphragm will be good on your pen, the test is to remove the blind cap, blow down it and if you can blow past the diaphragm then you know its bad. I am not one to repair Vacs and usually send them away, the specialists repair them every day and Vacs can be difficult to open, also the breather tube has its problems and I have see some bodged repairs on the plunger, for £20 I will leave it to someone else.

I can certainly understand sending it to an expert, but part of the fascination of this hobby for me is learning about how the pens work and trying to fix them myself. The pic above was the one I did the breather on (it actually arrived without a breather tube at all, which was why it wouldn't fill properly) and it's been fine since. I know Vacs can be challenging, but I like the idea of having a go. That said, the diaphragm may turn out to be fine.

Robbo 27 said:

In terms of reference books I have the Vacumatic book by David Shepherd, this reference book is getting really hard to find now, when I am old and gummy I will put these reference books on here for those that want them.

Thanks for both the reference, and the offer.
As I think (and hope) it'll be a long time before you're old and gummy, I've had a look around re. the book. I found it on David Shepherd's website apparently for £40, but the site seems unresponsive and refuses to send a message. I've then searched around a bit more, and found several copies on ebay for well above £100 (which is a bit steep). Finally I found a copy for £45 from Andy's Pens, which I've ordered, along with a copy of David Shepherd's other book on the Parker 51 also for the same price. I'm still on the lookout for a copy of the Parker Duofold book, but not in any rush at the moment. These 2 will make a good Xmas present!!

I'm now looking forward to reading a lot more about Vacumatics as, after the 51, and maybe the old Duofolds/Lucky Curves, they are one of my favourite old pens. I'd one day love to find a Vac in the "Golden Web" colour and maybe a Parker Royal Challenger in brown with the sword clip too.

[C&C]

Clockwork Cupcake said:

Robbo 27 said:

The staff saw him counting out his change to pay for the 51 and realised that he had very little money left, they asked if he had enough to pay for his lunch, when he said no they invited him back to have sandwiches and a cup of tea with them, he became a lifelong Parker fan after that.

Wouldn't happen today, sadly. Very few companies still have a concept of customer loyalty and customer retention.

Sadly, I think you're right.

There are one or two (usually very small) that do get it, but their numbers are dwindling I fear!

[Robbo 27]

CandC said:

Thanks for both the reference, and the offer.
As I think (and hope) it'll be a long time before you're old and gummy, I've had a look around re. the book. I found it on David Shepherd's website apparently for £40, but the site seems unresponsive and refuses to send a message. I've then searched around a bit more, and found several copies on ebay for well above £100 (which is a bit steep). Finally I found a copy for £45 from Andy's Pens, which I've ordered, along with a copy of David Shepherd's other book on the Parker 51 also for the same price. I'm still on the lookout for a copy of the Parker Duofold book, but not in any rush at the moment. These 2 will make a good Xmas present!!

I'm now looking forward to reading a lot more about Vacumatics as, after the 51, and maybe the old Duofolds/Lucky Curves, they are one of my favourite old pens. I'd one day love to find a Vac in the "Golden Web" colour and maybe a Parker Royal Challenger in brown with the sword clip too.

David is hard to get hold of, not sure why. He has a business called Surrenden but there is no contact information. I was trying to get hold of him a couple of months ago because someone in Spain was passing off his work as their own and publishing it on the net.

The books are great, good reference works but they are not 'how to' books. you are right about the high prices being asked for these books on the internet and ebay, you can easily pay 4X the original price, I suppose due to low production runs. I saw the Mabie Todd book which had a ticket price of about £60 on launch date which a BIN price of £300 on ebay.

Have a look at the 51s in this catalog,


https://gopens.com/catalog-91/

Edited by Robbo 27 on Tuesday 10th December 19:11

[Robbo 27]

A word of warning, there are many Parkers being advertised for sale on ebay from China, the pics that are shown is often genuine but if any pen arrives it is different from the pic, it is a fake.

The sale price is usually under £10. There was another wave of these pens 6 months ago, the seller said that the pens would take 3 months to arrive, a fake tracking number was given. No pens were sent out.

Take care, at face value this deal looks good, actually too good.

[C&C]

Robbo 27 said:

Have a look at the 51s in this catalog,

https://gopens.com/catalog-91/

Thanks for the link - some really nice pens of all sorts there!

I've been on ebay again for (yet) another Parker 51, although my first all rolled gold one.

Pictures make the scratches look worse than in real life, but some (gentle) polishing and tidying up should see a major improvement.
I'm aware the polishing needs to be gentle due to the thickness of the rolled gold!

It also appears to have a stub nib, so pleased with this - unlike some people, I really get on well with stub nibs.

Untitled by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Untitled by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Untitled by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Untitled by conradsphotos, on Flickr

[Robbo 27]

A stub nibbed 51, very impressive. as you know these are really hard to find, I have only seen a handful of all gold 51s, I think what few were sold ended up as presentation pieces, especially for retirement gifts. My only thought is on the threads between the section and the barrel, are they ok? Although it shouldnt be diffficult to find a replacement section if they have gone bad.

I have only owned one 51 Insignia/Signet in recent times and I think it was a pen with a bit of a story to tell.

It had been bought by Martin Fox in 1954 from Parker in Bush House, Fox was the manager and later owner of the Tropecana Night Club in Havana which was popular with Che Guevara and he is known to have used Martin Fox's office for his activities and there is a 1958 picture on the internet of him with a Parker 51 in his top pocket, Guevara was captured soon after, without checking I think it was 1959. The pen was sold in a general auction in Miami in 1964 and bought by either Parker UK or at least one of its Managers who collected Parker pens with a bit of a past. I bought it about 4 years ago, never used it. When a friend of mine in New Jersey, a very popular bloke on FPN username ParkerDuofold, wanted to try and buy an interesting 51 I sent him this pen as a gift. He really liked it and used it. A few months later he went out for a country walk, fell down a mountain side and died soon after. He had a PA and she closed down his FPN account and also wrote to me telling me that he was buried with this Martin Fox 51.

To be honest, I wouldnt want it back.














The box isnt contemporary to the pen unfortunately


ETA Pic of Guevara and a Parker 51

Edited by Robbo 27 on Friday 20th December 13:46

[C&C]

Robbo 27 said:

A stub nibbed 51, very impressive. as you know these are really hard to find, I have only seen a handful of all gold 51s, I think what few were sold ended up as presentation pieces, especially for retirement gifts. My only thought is on the threads between the section and the barrel, are they ok? Although it shouldn't be difficult to find a replacement section if they have gone bad.

I have only owned one 51 Insignia in recent times and I think it was a pen with a bit of a story to tell.

Interesting story re. your 51. I don't think I'd want it back given the guy's demise.

You're right re. the threads - not perfect, but the barrel actually screws onto the section fine. I'm going to have a play with these as well to see if I can tidy them up a bit, but as you say, if I'm not satisfied with the outcome, I'll swap the section with one of the many others I have.

I'm also happy that the flat area for engraving a name on it hasn't been used and remains blank.

[cherie171]

Does anyone know anything about Acura fountain pens?

I have one that's featured on this page: http://www.hisnibs.com/dragon.htm a gold dragon, with the two-tone 14k nib. It's never seen ink, and has been in its box for the last 14+ years.

Are they in any way desirable, or worth anything now?



Could do with the cash more than the pen if it's worth anything.

[Robbo 27]

The Acura brand is from Taiwan, sorry to say that it is not worth very much, perhaps £30 or so. The price is not likely to increase with time.

You might do well on ebay with global sales option selected, perhaps the market for this pen is back in the Far East. Jinhao made a similar pen with snake design a few years ago, they sell for less than £10 now, pictured below.

The overlay is not to everyones taste, sad when you think of all the work that has gone into its making.

[cherie171]

Thank Robbo, I knew someone here would have an idea. For once Google wasn't actually any help.

I may as well hang on to it, I do like the pen, and the effort of trying to sell it is not enough for the potential return. I'd like to say that at least I didn't pay for it, but seeing as that ex left me with about £30k of debt (thankfully now gone), I probably did in reality!

[Clockwork Cupcake]

cherie171 said:

I'd like to say that at least I didn't pay for it, but seeing as that ex left me with about £30k of debt (thankfully now gone), I probably did in reality!

I know that feeling.

[Exige77]

Anyone familiar with Diplomat pens ?

I’ve been asked to to some work for them so was wondering if there are any owners on here.

Seems a French family bought the company but they are still made at their traditional site in Germany.

[Robbo 27]

Exige77 said:

Anyone familiar with Diplomat pens ?

I’ve been asked to to some work for them so was wondering if there are any owners on here.

Seems a French family bought the company but they are still made at their traditional site in Germany.

I have only owned one about 15 years ago, a cheapie costing £7 from ebay.de. The pen was a very simple cartridge pen but had a very good gold nib, yet another pen that I wish I still owned.

Generally, Diplomat have a reputation for producing excellent nibs and a different style, the only issue I have heard of is with regards to the clips being a little flimsy.

Not sure that Diplomat have a UK agent, I havent seen them at any pen show.


eta. I didnt know this, Diplomat pens are in the UK, I have found them on the penheaven site

https://www.penheaven.co.uk/pen-brands/diplomat-pe...

Edited by Robbo 27 on Friday 31st January 17:51

[anonymous-user]

Are we allowed to mention 'affordable' fountain pens in this thread?

I fancied a fountain pen, but didn't want to go nuts as I haven't used one since school and was worried it would merely be used once and left in a drawer.

So I did plenty of research on inexpensive fountain pens and the TWSBI Eco kept coming up time and time again in youtube reviews as being extremely good for the price.

They are available in various colours or completely clear, and I went for a the clear option as I think it looks fun. Bought some Waterman 'Serenty Blue' ink to go with it.

It cost me £28 for the pen, and I couldn't be happier with it, especially for the price. Highly recommend.

Available from lots of places, but these people seem to have a good selection.

https://www.penheaven.co.uk/pen-brands/twsbi/twsbi...

[Clockwork Cupcake]

Lord Marylebone said:

Are we allowed to mention 'affordable' fountain pens in this thread?

Absolutely! If you scroll back to earlier in the thread, many of us went a bit nuts on sub-£5 Chinese pens from Jinhao, Hero, and Baoer.

Also, my daily writer is a Lamy Safari with the smoothest nib you can imagine (although I think I have Robbo to thank for that).

Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Friday 31st January 18:33