Brand new Platinum Preppy won’t write?

[Epiphany Writes]

Hi all! I’m a fountain pen newbie and I recently purchased a green platinum preppy in a fine 0.3 nib. I’ve heard so many good things about this pen so I wanted to give it a shot! I snapped the cartridge that came with the pen into the feed, then tried to write aaaand… no ink came out. So I waited for a few hours, tried again, and it wrote a tiny bit before going dry. It’s been a few days now and while I’ve been able to get a few pages out of it after shaking like mad, it normally runs dry after writing about 3 - 4 sentences. Is this normal and the Preppy just isn’t as reliable a pen as I thought? Or did I get a dud and I should try buying another one? 

[Harold]

One thing you can try is cleaning the pen with some water with mild dish soap in it. Sometimes you can get some machining oils from the manufacturing process stuck in the feed and that can hamper the ink flow. The most effective way to do this is to buy a bulb syringe at a drug store, filling it first with the soapy water and sticking it in the back of the grip section to flush it through(it may be helpful to snip a bit off the end of the syringe to get a snug fit). Repeat with plain water and hold a paper towel to the nib to suck out the excess water. You may want to hold on to the grip section so it doesn't get launched across the room.

[Sailor Kenshin]

Not at all normal for a Preppy!  They are known for writing and writing right out of the box...especially with the cartridge they come with.

 

Where did you buy it, and is it possible to return or exchange the pen?

[essayfaire]

Have you tried just squeezing the cartridge a few times to get the ink to start flowing?  If you can do that it should  write correctly from that point on.  

[AmandaW]

Hmmmm...very odd for a Preppy!

 

If I have a pen with a dry nib that won't start I dip the nib quickly in clean water then hold it in a paper towel or tissue to help suck it out until it runs properly. If that doesn't work: bulb syringe as Harold explained.

 

[arcfide]

Just another possible theory that you should rule out. The Preppy with a Fine nib is a very fine metal tip which I have seen bent out of shape by over eager writers. If you are new, as you say, then it's possible that if you tried to write immediately after inserting the cartridge when the nib was still dry and hadn't saturated with ink, that you may have instinctually pressed hard on the nib to see if you could get some ink out. That could have bent the nib a little bit, and if it's enough to separate the nib from the plastic feed underneath it, that could affect flow. 

 

If you look at the nib from the side, you should be able to see the plastic feed in full contact with the nib and the nib straight, not bent up. 

 

Also, do make sure the cartridge is fully inserted. With Preppy's and Platinum's ink cartridges, they normally go right in definitively because of the agitator ball that seals the cartridges, but it's worth checking just in case. 

 

Otherwise, no, this is not normal. Preppy's, and most other Platinum pens are exceptionally reliable. 

[Sailor Kenshin]

You would need to be Hercules to squeeze a Preppy cart.

[Epiphany Writes]

15 hours ago, Harold said:

One thing you can try is cleaning the pen with some water with mild dish soap in it. Sometimes you can get some machining oils from the manufacturing process stuck in the feed and that can hamper the ink flow. The most effective way to do this is to buy a bulb syringe at a drug store, filling it first with the soapy water and sticking it in the back of the grip section to flush it through(it may be helpful to snip a bit off the end of the syringe to get a snug fit). Repeat with plain water and hold a paper towel to the nib to suck out the excess water. You may want to hold on to the grip section so it doesn't get launched across the room.

Thanks for the advice! I already tried flushing the feed with just plain tap water but I didn't try dish soap to cut any potential grease. I'll try that and see if it works. 

[Epiphany Writes]

15 hours ago, Sailor Kenshin said:

Not at all normal for a Preppy!  They are known for writing and writing right out of the box...especially with the cartridge they come with.

 

Where did you buy it, and is it possible to return or exchange the pen?

I bought it from the gift shop of a local art gallery. One thing I noticed was that it wasn't packaged so maybe another customer damaged it? Who knows. Unfortunately I didn't take my receipt oops 😓

[Epiphany Writes]

17 hours ago, Harold said:

One thing you can try is cleaning the pen with some water with mild dish soap in it. Sometimes you can get some machining oils from the manufacturing process stuck in the feed and that can hamper the ink flow. The most effective way to do this is to buy a bulb syringe at a drug store, filling it first with the soapy water and sticking it in the back of the grip section to flush it through(it may be helpful to snip a bit off the end of the syringe to get a snug fit). Repeat with plain water and hold a paper towel to the nib to suck out the excess water. You may want to hold on to the grip section so it doesn't get launched across the room.

This seemed to work! I didn't have a bulb syringe and didn't feel like buying one, so instead I filled the the feed with diluted dish soap and let it drip through the nib (4 times). Then I directed a concentrated jet of water from a blunt-end syringe at the feed opening, and finally I flushed the feed with tap water. Not as precise as your method but it seemed to do the trick. The pen is working fine now! Thanks again!

[arcfide]

Great to hear! Are you using their green ink? I'm a huge fan of Platinum's Blue Black ink, and my daughter loves their green. 🙂 

[Epiphany Writes]

16 hours ago, arcfide said:

Great to hear! Are you using their green ink? I'm a huge fan of Platinum's Blue Black ink, and my daughter loves their green. 🙂 

Yes I'm using the green ink! I love using it for marking especially, and I'd love to try their black next. 

[Harold]

You're welcome, happy to hear it's working properly now.

[arcfide]

18 hours ago, Epiphany Writes said:

Yes I'm using the green ink! I love using it for marking especially, and I'd love to try their black next. 

 

I hope you have fun! Remember that they have two different black inks, a pigmented, very permanent Carbon ink, and another, dye-based black ink. 

[MuddyWaters]

Glad the cleaning trick worked. Ive had issues with old cartridges being harder to start up in platinum pens, even 3776 ones. Took a few days for things to really get started. I don't know if it's because of dry ink or the ink declogged oils in the feed...

 

In any case, I think these hypotheses are more likely than faulty feed or nib. 

[kaushla]

On 12/7/2021 at 7:15 PM, Sailor Kenshin said:

You would need to be Hercules to squeeze a Preppy cart.

😀 Agree wholeheartedly. The 0.2 Platinum Preppy can be particularly troublesome with ink flow. That is what mine is suffering from now. The 0.5 Preppy, though it was left unused with a dried up ink cartridge for a much longer time, responded far quicker to flushing and soaking in a dilute water and dish detergent solution. The 0.2 has still not recovered its flow. About the only thing that has made a slight difference is rolling the flat of the nib to and fro with mild pressure on plain writing paper.  That is to get the nib closer to the feed though no gap was noticed.