Cleaning out dried ink from pens after 40 years

[gross]

Patience. It's like pealing wallpaper. Just continue what you are doing.

+1

 

+2

+3

 

I would advise you to avoid the technical pen cleaner and stick to the water. You have a pen or pens that have dried ink in them but are filling with water. Don't damage the filling mechanism. Stay with it and you will have a pen or pens that work well. They did not get into that condition over night and they aren't going to get fixed over night. It takes time.

[cfclark]

+1 on the ultrasonic cleaner.

 

+1 more on this. Got one for Christmas and have already used it on a couple of flea-market finds.

[Garageboy]

Just keep rinsing. Let the water soak in for a day, then purge and refill and repeat. takes a while. Just be glad they are not lever fills (the skin under my nails are cringing right now)

[georges zaslavsky]

use slightly warm water with soap and flush the pen as many times as necessary and after the pen is clean, fill it with your favorite ink and it should work. If this doesn't work, send it to Mike Masumaya.

Edited January 10, 2010 by georges zaslavsky

[gross]

Just keep rinsing. Let the water soak in for a day, then purge and refill and repeat. takes a while. Just be glad they are not lever fills (the skin under my nails are cringing right now)

Man oh man and how! Oh, so very true! Sore thumbs, sore thumbs!

[gyasko]

Fill the pen with water, thus reconstituting the ink. Write. Enjoy.

 

I realise it's too late for that now.

[czanguine]

I'm having the same problem too but with Permanent Blue and Sheaffer Purple (supposedly one of the least-staining inks readily available in most bookstores) that I had left for several months inside my Parker Prera and a Sheaffer Prelude. I've tried rinsing them both out with mild soapy water, sometimes with water alone, and right now the pens remain dipped into shotglasses filled with water. After a few hours, I come back and see that the water in the glasses has turned purple and blue each. This seems to be a never-ending process and I don't know how much longer this could go on. Could there really be that much ink in those pens' feeds?!

Edited March 4, 2013 by czanguine

[Bo Bo Olson]

Have you pressed the little green or black reserve tank button on the bottom of the nib???

 

You have a full reserve tank. Which is why you can't get rid of the ink.

 

Half fill the piston....press the reserve button, shake, twist out the nib...does twist out just like a Pelikan...

run water over it.

 

Put the the nib back on...press the reserve tank button back up into the pen....when you crank the piston all the way down, it pushes out the reserve button....so don't push the piston all the way down...right now.

 

After you have the ink out of the reserve tank, crank the piston all the way down, that loads the reserve tank.

 

You get 1-3 pages of writing when you run out of ink, and press the reserve button on the bottom of your nib.

 

Picture of pen and cap top will help me tell you which Geha you have.

Edited March 4, 2013 by Bo Bo Olson

[Paddler]

At this point, I would switch to flushing and soaking with distilled water. It is much better at dissolving things than most tap water.

[mhphoto]

When I'm faced with this situation I always take it down completely and scrub-scrub-scrub.

[Bo Bo Olson]

The reserve tank makes it extremely hard to get into the cylinder from in the front of a vintage Geha.

 

Go taking a piston pen apart to clean it...as noobie means you have spare parts....yep.

A pile of spare parts.

 

It does sound like it had iron gall ink in it....so try a bit of vinegar 10% or so.

Our member who makes iron gall inks says first vinegar, then soap and then ammonia.

A little late for that advice...but you can still try a bit of vinegar.

 

If you have a needle syringe you can flush the pen out quickly and easily after twisting off the nib and section. That might help clean out the reserve tank...a rubber ear syringe should work too.

Better than cranking a piston up and down.

[bitjit]

Any clues on how to clean stained pen body ? It's an eyedropper , I flushed it several times and still water is inky, I will keep rinsing it for that issue, but the body seems to be stained by the long dried ink,how to I clean that out ?

[ac12]

 

Any clues on how to clean stained pen body ? It's an eyedropper , I flushed it several times and still water is inky, I will keep rinsing it for that issue, but the body seems to be stained by the long dried ink,how to I clean that out ?

 

 

I would use a cotton swab and wipe the inside of the eye dropper case.

But staining is likely inside the material of the pen body, so unlikely to be wiped off.

 

Dried ink can/will take a LONG LONG time to clean out. This is because you have to dissolve the dried ink to be able to wash it out. I suggest leaving it to soak for 6 hours, rinse, then soak again, and just keep repeating the cycle over and over, until the rinse water is clear. And if it is red or purple ink, expect it to take even longer. It took me 3 weeks to clean the red ink out of a Parker 51.

Edited July 13, 2016 by ac12