Esterbrooks Write Differently

[Ultradawg]

Hello all

I've just started playing with esterbrooks. I purchased my fIraq one with a 2668 nib and it writes like a dream; smooth writing, no tooth good ink flow. I just got my second with a 56xx nib and it's horrible, requires pressure,,poor ink flow scratchy etc. I know the 5600 is a turned down nib but the difference is too much.

 

 

Questions

Is it normal for a 5 series to be so hard to use

 

Any potential fixes short of replacing the nib

 

Any help is appreciated

[JonSzanto]

Well, your question raises... interesting questions!

 

The 5xxx series nibs were made for Dip-Less pen sets. The entire nib unit (nib/feed/collar) was made to just push into the dip pen holder, and then placed in the inkwell. As such, there is no ink channel cut in the feed, and the back of the collar is solid, with no holes. If this kind of nib unit was just jammed into a regular pen (there are no threads on the collar like other nib units), there would be no way for the ink to come through to the feed/nib. On the other hand, if someone removed the nib itself and put it in another nib unit (unlikely, but possible), then you would just need to adjust the nib as per any other nib. Both of my 5668 units in a double-well Dip-Less set write comfortably, if not spectacularly.

 

Photos would help.

[JonSzanto]

Hello?

[Ultradawg]

Sorry I lost my own thread. I looked carefully and it was a dip pen nib.n it was an eBay deal of about 30.00 so I did the easy thing and purchased another 2668 nib. Now both 2668s write a bit differently but they are both great writers.

 

Side note: with the eBay pen that section was loose enoug that I could remove it from the barrel. So I got to peak inside and see the guts. Fairly straight forward stuff. I'm now thinking of buying a couple unrestored and atempting to repair them.

 

You all are right it's addictive.

[welch]

Sorry I lost my own thread. I looked carefully and it was a dip pen nib.n it was an eBay deal of about 30.00 so I did the easy thing and purchased another 2668 nib. Now both 2668s write a bit differently but they are both great writers.

 

Side note: with the eBay pen that section was loose enoug that I could remove it from the barrel. So I got to peak inside and see the guts. Fairly straight forward stuff. I'm now thinking of buying a couple unrestored and atempting to repair them.

 

You all are right it's addictive.

 

 

A secret that few admit: we prefer an unrestored Esterbrook because it is FUN -- plain fun -- to replace the sac.

 

It's hard to damage an Estie...they are tough. It's "educational" to peer down the barrel and to scrape out dead sac...something like fountain pen archeology. Replacing a lever mechanism is different. Someone here (Bruce?) described it as like "doing brain surgery on yourself through your own ear". Sounds painful.

 

As mentioned in another thread, jewels were not meant to be replaced; there is a rumor that an Estie-fan made replacement jewels but gave up...maybe because not enough people bought them.

 

If I was King of the World, or a graduate of Hogwarts, I would make parts for the Esterbrook J and the Parker 51. Right now, we are cannibalizing parts from broken pens, but in the last five or six years, I have noticed that it is harder to find:

 

- 9xxx points

- P-51 gold nibs

- P-51 collectors.

[trdsf]

It's hard to damage an Estie...they are tough.

 

I've always described them as the VW (classic) Beetle of the pen world -- they won't break on their own, you have to put an effort into it.

 

And yeah, I love the restoration part of collecting... the black LJ I just got needed a new sac and a new J-bar; I cannibalized the latter ouf of a Wearever that I wasn't particularly planning on restoring, shellacked on a new sac and... cranky nib (1551, I think?). So I swapped that out for the 9550 that was in a desk pen I'm not currently using, and yet another Estie does what they do best: writes like a dream.