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When cleaning and refilling one of my Wing Sung 3008 pens to give it to my son who wanted to use it in school I encountered a stubborn clear feed that would not want to give away all of its orange glory (Akkerman #16 Oranje Boven) after cleaning and even after refilling the pen with Lamy (Royal) Blue. So I was able to take the following pictures. Edit: (Was interrupted before I could add what I was going for, tsss ...) What do your feeds look like? Do you have unusual or unusually beautiful feeds? I am sure you have!

I would like to share my experience with cleaning a pen after prolonged exposure to Iron-Gall ink. I've filled my TWSBI 580 Diamond with KWZ Ink IG Blue Black in April 2016, and refilled it six times without flushing (despite warnings on KWZ Ink webpage). In February 2017 my pen looked like that: http://i.imgur.com/GkSBpOj.jpg Along piston operating range barrel was clean, but below there was dark residue. I've asked Mrs KWZI for some hints on cleaning my pen. She adviced me to crush three pills of Vitamin C (in Poland Vitamin C is sold as 200mg pills), dissolve them in 30ml of water, and load this solution to my pen and keep it there for a few minutes, and repeat this procedure until residue is dissolved. I had no Vitamin C at home, so I used the following procedure: I've measured 1g of citric acid (white pellets).I've added ~50ml of demineralized water (tap water is very hard at my place, it is the same demineralized water I use to fill steam iron).I've heated it to 35° Celsius (to make it easier to dissolve citric acid, this step is not strictly necessary, but I had baby bottle heater available)I've stirred it (or rather shaken, as my container had a lid).I've filled my pen with solution, waited 5-10 minutes, gave it good shake and emptied it.I've repeated step 5 until residue was dissolved (three more time).I've flushed the pen with demineralized water twice.http://i.imgur.com/eH33DgA.jpg Later I was told that: ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) is more effective than citric acid.citric acid works better if one adds a little of baking soda.

Hi all, I've recently taken possession of a mint/near-mint black visulated Parker Vacumatic, dated 3rd quarter of 1946. While it doesn't any longer have the two stickers on the cap, it still has the remaining circular residue. I attempted to use cold water and a bit of microfibre cloth to get it off, but it's pretty damn stubborn. I've done a search of the forums and have tried heating it (very gently!) with a hairdryer, but I didn't dare push any further lest the whole cap light up in my face. Rather stupidly, I tried a very light localised application of WD-40, before realising that it was most likely definitely a bad idea, then proceeded to soak the cap briefly and wash off any residue. At this stage, am I correct in thinking that the best way to proceed is with some lighter fluid? I noticed a lot of support for naptha, but I think naptha is a North American term, and insofar as I know, we in Australia don't have any sort of direct equivalent. I think Shellite would be the closest. I'm guessing if all else fails, I'll need to proceed with micromesh + microgloss!