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I have a number of 1994 Sonnets, which I love. But they tend to dry out overnight, and in some cases an ink cartridge only a couple of weeks old and hardly used has evaporated almost completely. It seems this is a problem lots of people have had. I have read various ideas for solutions on the FPN, and this request is to ask which solution is best. Am I right that it is due to the ventilation holes in the end of the cap being too large? I have seen the suggestion that dripping candle wax into the inside of the cap can seal the holes. This seems straightforward but I do a fair amount of work in tropical climates and I'm a bit worried about the wax melting. Liquid epoxy has been suggested but wouldn't this be irreversible? Or does that not matter? Or would shellac do the trick? If anyone has experience of these or any other methods, please enlighten me!

I have a thirty year old Sailor 1911 model fountain pen with a fine point. I love this pen, but if I don't use it for a day or two the nib dries out even with the cap tightly sealed. I was wondering if there were something -- such as silicone -- I could put on the cap threads to prevent this from happening. I have some inexpensive Pilots and Lamys that will work perfectly even after being in a drawer for a couple of weeks and I've noticed that these pens have caps that seal really well. Any help will be very much appreciated Martin

I've got a Faber Castell Ambition inked-up with Diamine Eclipse. Unfortunately it drys out after a couple of days of not being used. I'm not sure if this is a function of the pen's nib (it has no breather hole), the ink, the cap, or the storage. It is stored with many other Waterman and Kaweco pens in a dry box - none of which exhibit this problem. Can anyone provide any insight into this problem? Having to dip the pen and invariably getting ink on my fingers each time I use it , is frustrating and discouraging its use. Will a change of ink make a difference? thanks tbzbbt

Hello FPN! I am fairly new to this hobby, but not so much so ( 1 year). Last Christmas, I got a Lamy 2000 with a fine nib, and had it ground to a stub. I have never encountered the sweet spot, and have had no problems with it until just recently. So, for about a single A4 page, the lamy will write, and it will be fine. It becomes dryer, and dryer, until it simply stops writing completely, and I can see the gap between the tines. This is very infuriating, so for the past three days I have been trying to fix it. First, I flushed it, then soaked it in water and a tiny bit of detergent, but I have gotten no progress. Yesterday, I decided to examine it further. Because the nib flowed fine ( the tines weren't to close nor too far apart) I assume it's the feed. I let it soak for a hour, dried it, then examine it. I don't see any particular debris or disruptions at all. So, I put it back in the pen, and wrote A5 pages, then it stopped again. I quickly disassembled the section, and looked at the feed. I saw that it looked dry; none of the fins had ink in them, and the slit was relatively dry. Without assembling it, I put the end of the feed into the body ( like it usually is) and I didn't see any ink feeding from the body to the feed. So, here I am. Any Ideas? I don't really know what to do, and I don't want to send it to Lamy. Anything I could do myself, or should I just try to get a new feed from Lamy?

I've purchased a number of Jinhao pens (and a few Baoers) in recent months via eBay. I like the way they write (with one or two exceptions) but they seem to dry out very quickly. (My Parker 51, TWSBI Mini, and Pilot Varsities can go a long time without use and start right up. I haven't even found how long is too long!) Generally, re: my Jinhao's and Baoers: If not used for a day or two, they'll start hard.If not used for 2 or 3 days, they'll need priming (twisting the convertor or running the nib under water)They seem to do a little better when stored horizontally rather than vertically.No, it's not an issue of the ink "sticking" to the rear of the converter because I've gotten into the habit of shaking them downward before use.I don't think it's a broken inner lid--they still have a satisfying snap when opening and closing. I also opened one to verify and the inner cap was fine. So, is this merely the reality of cheap pens not sealing particularly well? I've seen some folks talking about the converters being (partly?) to blame. Can y'all advise and help me improve this issue? Thanks! Dylan Postscript: I'm using Jinhao x450s, x750s, 159, and Baoer 801, 508.