What are these odd nibs I just found?

January 7, 2009

I just bought out an estate of about 50 pens. There are some very nice pens but I'm having trouble identifying some "nibs". I use nibs loosely because they don't look like nibs. The first are Two inkographs with just a straight skinny tube for writing. Now here comes the hard one. I got a pen that has an external slide on the barrell marked made in japan on the slide. The tip however has 4 or 5 tubes that come out and twist/taper to the point. I've only been collecting for a year and this is new to me. Paid 12.50 at auction for this pen so even if it's worthless I'll enjoy it, if I can get the thing apart. Any help please?

January 7, 2009

welcome to FPN!!

i dunno but it sounds like a multifunction pen rather than a fountain pen???!!!!! pix would help.

January 7, 2009

I just bought out an estate of about 50 pens. There are some very nice pens but I'm having trouble identifying some "nibs". I use nibs loosely because they don't look like nibs. The first are Two inkographs with just a straight skinny tube for writing. Now here comes the hard one. I got a pen that has an external slide on the barrell marked made in japan on the slide. The tip however has 4 or 5 tubes that come out and twist/taper to the point. I've only been collecting for a year and this is new to me. Paid 12.50 at auction for this pen so even if it's worthless I'll enjoy it, if I can get the thing apart. Any help please?

Are you sure it's not a mechanical pencil?

As lovemy51 said, some graphic evidence would help a lot.

January 7, 2009

First of all, welcome to FPN.

Sounds like the first two are rapidograph design, for technical drawing. The last one sounds like a glass nib crescent filler, probably by Spors. I bet it looks something like this:

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l279/T-Caster/P1020180.jpg

If so, the crescent shaped piece sticking out of the side is the counterpart of a lever in a lever fill. One rotates the black plastic band until the gap is just below the crescent. Now press the crescent down, and a bar inside pushes the air out of the sac. Releasing the crescent allows the sac to fill. The ink flows down the ribs in the nib to transfer to the paper. If the nib is scratchy, it can be polished with the finer grits of micromesh, but go very easy, and don't use regular sandpaper, it's much to rough.

The Spors pens aren't worth much, but are fun to have, and make very good dip pens. $12 sounds about right.

Dan

Edited January 7, 2009 by DanF

January 7, 2009

Definitely not a pencil. I will post pics tommorrow.

January 7, 2009

Sounds like the first two are rapidograph design, for technical drawing.

That's very close. The Inkographs are stylographic pens. They work on the same principle as technical pens, but are made for writing, with the pen held at a normal writing angle.

-- Brian

January 7, 2009

First of all, welcome to FPN.

Sounds like the first two are rapidograph design, for technical drawing. The last one sounds like a glass nib crescent filler, probably by Spors. I bet it looks something like this:

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l279/T-Caster/P1020180.jpg

If so, the crescent shaped piece sticking out of the side is the counterpart of a lever in a lever fill. One rotates the black plastic band until the gap is just below the crescent. Now press the crescent down, and a bar inside pushes the air out of the sac. Releasing the crescent allows the sac to fill. The ink flows down the ribs in the nib to transfer to the paper. If the nib is scratchy, it can be polished with the finer grits of micromesh, but go very easy, and don't use regular sandpaper, it's much to rough.

The Spors pens aren't worth much, but are fun to have, and make very good dip pens. $12 sounds about right.

Dan

riiiiight!!! tubes that go around and taper to the point with slide bar......... i think you hit the nail in the head, Dan!!!

January 7, 2009

Thank's all! All hit on the hear. You are right DanF , that's it. And I did find some old ads for the inkographs.

January 7, 2009

Hi,

The Japanese glass-nib pens can be fun to write with. I'm no expert on them, but I did restore one last week (a lever-filler rather than a crescent-filler), so the experience is fresh in my mind.

For me, the hardest part of the restoration was getting the section free of the barrel. When these pens were originally marketed, the sales materials actually called out, as a "feature," the fact that the section was permanently glued in place...making it impossible for ham-fisted consumers to mess up the pen's inner workings. I can attest to the fact that the section was awfully stubborn; the section/barrel joint was virtually seamless, feeling more "fused" than friction-fit. Removing the section required several applications of heat, and a fair amount of work with the section wrench. The section didn't come out in slow stages, as many do; it popped out "all at once" when the adhesive finally let go. Very dramatic, but - happily - there was no damage.

I also found that the glass nib's smoothness varied greatly depending on which "facet" (not the right word, but hopefully it conveys the idea) was contacting the paper. So when I reassembled the pen, I experimented to find the "facet" that afforded optimum smoothness, and inserted the section so that that "facet" was rotated 180 degrees from the lever (the crescent would work the same way). Now, when I pick up the pen to write, I simply make sure that the lever is facing up, and I know that the smoothest "facet" will be touching the paper. It's an intuitive process, because it's a fairly standard practice, in the U.S. at least, to install the section so that the top of the nib aligns with the lever.

Anyway - not sure any of that is useful, but there it is. For me, the novelty of being able to write with this pen was well worth the effort of restoring it.

Cheers,

Jon

PS Another "feature" called out in the original sales materials was the fact that the pen cleaned itself very efficiently, because pressing the crescent (or lever) could shoot a jet of water very forcefully from the nib end. That also seems to be true; it's extremely quick and easy to flush this pen. (I assume the absence of a traditional feed is the relevant design element here.)

January 7, 2009

Univer--- Thanks for the additional info. I have three of these I picked up on eBay in a group, tried to restore one, but couldn't get the section off. I guess I'll keep trying.

Dan