Was This A Good Deal?

[Venemo]

At the end of the day, I decided to order a stainless steel breather tube and a pack of aerometric sacs from David Nishimura. Not sure how long the airmail will take to arrive here, but let's see what happens.

[Venemo]

Hey guys, I have two more stupid questions:

 

• When I put together the pen, do I have to shellac the hood into its place? I would prefer not to glue it there at all (so that I can clean the pen more easily if I have to).
• Do I need shellac to set the new sac in its place, or is it enough to just apply some heat?

[mariom]

 

Hey guys, I have two more stupid questions:

 

• When I put together the pen, do I have to shellac the hood into its place? I would prefer not to glue it there at all (so that I can clean the pen more easily if I have to).
• Do I need shellac to set the new sac in its place, or is it enough to just apply some heat?

 

 

The hood must be shellaced. The hood must NOT be shellaced. You should not use shellac, but use thread sealant instead. You should apply a little silicone grease to the threads. You must never use silicone grease near a P-51 collector.

 

I've asked the same question, and there's a variety of opinions. You can read the full discussion here. Although the original question related to a hood with an O-ring, the discussion should be broadly applicable to your pen. For what it's worth, I've currently adopted an approach of using a touch of silicone grease on the O-ring and no adhesive of any kind, but I'm open to modifying that approach in the future. I've experienced no problems so far, but it's early days yet.

 

As for the sac, it MUST be glued. Shellac should be OK, but I'm sure there's a variety of opinions about that as well.

[Venemo]

Thanks for your answer Mario.

 

I think the best way to decide about the hood is to simply try it without any adhesive and see what happens - if it leaks, it will need something, otherwise not.

I'll come back to this thread when I receive the stuff from David Nishimura and tell you how it went.

[OcalaFlGuy]

Yet another application of The Theory of the Floating Volkswagen.

 

In the early 70's there was a Beetle ad campaign that said, on the pic of a Beetle floating in water, "A Volkswagen will Definitely float, just not INdefinitely.

 

Therefore, extrapolated...

 

You may Definitely get away with an unsealed P-51 hood.

 

 

 

Just not INdefinitely...

 

Bruce in Ocala, Fl

[Matlock]

So if the doors on the VW Beetle had been sealed with shellac it would have floated INdefinitely?

[OcalaFlGuy]

I believe what sent the Beetle to the bottom was water intrusion from the (rear) engine compartment.

 

Vdub doors were airtight. You Could Not do the coat hanger trick with them, too good of a seal.

 

Bruce in Ocala, Fl

[mariom]

You may Definitely get away with an unsealed P-51 hood.

 

Just not INdefinitely...

 

At which point I will have learned a valuable life lesson first-hand, and will forever shellac all my hoods and advise all others to do likewise.

[Venemo]

Okay, I get it. I will definitely seal it then. However, is there anything that could be easier than sellac to remove, should the need arise? There is a website which suggests using rubber cement instead of shellac - what do you guys think about that?

[OcalaFlGuy]

My first choice would be Ron Zorn's section sealant.

 

Ernesto Soler, Mr. P-51, uses Rubber Cement. I sure he has put Some thought into what he uses. While I Would Not use rubber cement near most any other vintage pen, I doubt there is anything seriously problematic with using it on a P-51.

 

Bruce in Ocala, Fl

[Venemo]

I have some "UHU all purpose adhesive" - will this do the trick of gluing the sac to the connector? The website says it should work on everything excluding PE and PP.

[Venemo]

It's done!

 

The pen now works nicely. It can fill and write and doesn't leak (although I've decided not to seal the hood yet, in case I want to fiddle with the nib & feed).

 

I must tell you that this oblique nib is pretty interesting - a little bit similar to an italic, but broader than I'm used to. It's smooth once I get the hang of it, but I don't think it was meant for left-handed people like me.

 

EDIT:

In case anyone's in a similar situation, I'd like to point out a detail that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere. It does matter a lot how the Parker 51 nib and feed are aligned in relation to each other and especially how 'deep in' the feed is.

At my first attempt I got a pretty dry writer with occasional skipping that put down a line no thicker than a medium (pretty surprising from a 'bold oblique'). After some tweaking, it now feels a lot better: lays a generously wet and broad line and hardly ever skips. I'm in a whole new world of smoothness here. I've never had a high regard for broad nibs, but this is amazing!

Edited January 20, 2015 by Venemo

[Sasha Royale]

The sac is useless. I would assume that the pen has been neglected for a long time.

I recommend that you have the Parker 51 serviced and cleaned, professionally. Get

a silicon sac, if possible. The results will be a Parker 51 worth over $100, that will

last for 50 years.

 

Congratulations !

[mariom]

 

In case anyone's in a similar situation, I'd like to point out a detail that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere. It does matter a lot how the Parker 51 nib and feed are aligned in relation to each other and especially how 'deep in' the feed is.

 

Can you elaborate on this? In my 51s the feed appears to have a definite stop point when pushed into the collector, and the nib sort of follows with it. When the hood is screwed down, the amount of nib protruding is pretty consistent across 4 pens.

[Venemo]

The sac is useless. I would assume that the pen has been neglected for a long time.

I recommend that you have the Parker 51 serviced and cleaned, professionally.

 

If you mean the old sac, yeah, it is beyond any hope. But I got a new pli-glass sac from David Nishimura which works just fine - along with a new stainless steel breather tube.

 

 

Can you elaborate on this? In my 51s the feed appears to have a definite stop point when pushed into the collector, and the nib sort of follows with it. When the hood is screwed down, the amount of nib protruding is pretty consistent across 4 pens.

 

Yes, same here. The more you push the feed into the collector, the better your ink flow will be. At first, I made the mistake of not pushing it until the stop point and I got a lot better flow after I did.

Edited January 20, 2015 by Venemo

[Venemo]

The more I experiment with this nib, the more it feels like it is not meant for left-handed use.

 

What do you guys think about this? Can anything be done with it? Or maybe is there someone who would be interested in trading it for a regular medium or fine nib?