Surface Tension Problem

[Rach31]

Plastic seed beads? Are you sure? I have literally hundreds of different colors of them, because I do bead work jewelry, and all of mine are glass or stone. Which wouldn't tend to float or be too light, I'd think.

 

You can get glass and stone seed beads (and they come in several different sizes from 15 [smallest--so small that I need to use a magnifier and tweezers to work with them] to 8 [largest, and WAY too large for your intended use] ) all over the place. Walmart, Craft Warehouse, Joann's, Target, etc. I don't know if the OP has any of those stores where he lives, but basically any large "we sell everything" store or any craft store should sell them. They're almost always sold by weight, and are very inexpensive.

Maybe the reference is to plastic pony beads? I believe that's what the larger ones are called.

[Cassotto]

Update on my side:

 

I'm still reading you, still undecided. I mean, although I'm using up the ink in a cartridge with a view to using it with a syringe, I still want to try the agitator solution. Since converters are not readily available where I live, so I'm just getting ideas before I go somewhere else and buy different models in bulk .

 

I found in a drawer an unused Faber-Castell converter which I've put in my Jinhao 500. It works much better than the original Jinhao converter, though not 100% well. With all the converters I have / have had showing surface tension problems, the ink got stuck at one end of the converter, and nothing but a hard tap would make it fall to the other end, where it would get stuck again. With the Faber-Castell converter, a tap is still required, but once it's set the ink in motion, the ink keeps on flowing every time I turn the pen. It's only after I've had the pen stored for some time that the ink gets stuck again.

 

When I said that the ink kept on flowing when I turn the pen I mean exactly that. If I don't turn the pen upwards or downwards, but leave it horizontal, the ink doesn't flow, probably because it's not helped to the same degree by the law of gravity:

 

 

You see, the ink is not in the lower part of the converter, as it would be if everything were normal, but in what was the lower part the last time I held it vertically.

 

Anyway, my main purpose when I uploaded this photo was to ask you, do you know whether this converter can be disassembled to put a ball inside?

[ac12]

get a small sheet of rubber, grab the metal collar, then see if you can turn the collar.

The collar might be threaded or it might simply be a slip-on.

Once you get the collar loose, you can pull out the piston mechanism...CAREFULLY.

[Cassotto]

But do you know for a fact Faber-Castells converters can be disassembled? I'm a bit wary of the procedure you describe, since I applied it to my Waterman converter and destroyed it.

[ac12]

When you twist the collar, you do it by hand (with a rubber gripper), and feel for it moving or not.

If it does not feel like it is moving with medium force, STOP. This is how I determined that my Parker and Sheaffer converters could not be opened.

Do NOT use a plier, as you cannot feel anything through a plier, and it is very easy to use too much force.

Edited June 16, 2016 by ac12

[Cassotto]

If it does not feel like it is moving with medium force, STOP.

 

This is probably what went wrong when I broke my Waterman converter. I did it by hand, with rubber washing gloves, but I probably twisted too hard. I'll try to restrain myself!

[jar]

A second way to put something in to serve the purpose without taking stuff apart.

 

Find a small very week compression spring with a diameter smaller than the ID of the converter but wider than the opening nipple. Cut the spring so that in its normal state it is about as high as the overall diameter of the spring, then thread the spring into the converter so that it is fully inside a free to slide up and down.

 

It will break up any bubbles but also collapse during filling to allow you to get almost a complete fill. But it needs to be a weak compression spring and made from a steel that will not rust.

[ac12]

 

 

This is probably what went wrong when I broke my Waterman converter. I did it by hand, with rubber washing gloves, but I probably twisted too hard. I'll try to restrain myself!

 

 

That was what happened when I tried to remove a section from a pen.

Although I did NOT use a lot of force, the barrel of the pen just sheared. And I had a part of the broken pen in each hand

[Cassotto]

A second way to put something in to serve the purpose without taking stuff apart.

 

Find a small very week compression spring with a diameter smaller than the ID of the converter but wider than the opening nipple. Cut the spring so that in its normal state it is about as high as the overall diameter of the spring, then thread the spring into the converter so that it is fully inside a free to slide up and down.

 

It will break up any bubbles but also collapse during filling to allow you to get almost a complete fill. But it needs to be a weak compression spring and made from a steel that will not rust.

 

This is a great idea! Perhaps it'll take some effort to find the right spring, but it sounds like a perfect solution for all converters.

 

 

 

   

 

That was what happened when I tried to remove a section from a pen.

Although I did NOT use a lot of force, the barrel of the pen just sheared. And I had a part of the broken pen in each hand

 

Oops, it must have hurt. I mean, I was disappointed enough when I broke the converter, so I imagine that breaking a pen must be much worse. I didn't have the impression to be trying to outsamson Samson when I broke the converter, either. Perhaps it was cheap plastic.