Jump to content

Anyone Ever Get An Unnamed, Weird, Cheapie, Which Turned To Be A Lovely Writer?


Alexcat

Recommended Posts

I got this, along with a rollerball(which .i could get a refill for and use, if I wanted to....it's been used, the fountain pen had not)for very little....can't remember exactly, but certainly under £10

 

Well, the pen writes beautifully....smooth, glides over the paper, using a universal cartridge. Heavy, which I like.

 

No idea what it's made of, but actually feels like stone, or cement: it has a logo, which is

EL Business services

So I suspect it was a corporate gift.

 

Must be from a while back, as the nib says "Iridium point W. Germany"

 

So, has anyone else ever got a nameless, brandless, slightly odd pen, for not a lot of cash, and found it to be a pretty good one?

 

Alex

 

post-110936-0-86246000-1426326674_thumb.jpgpost-110936-0-86246000-1426326674_thumb.jpgpost-110936-0-55390600-1426326711_thumb.jpgpost-110936-0-83111400-1426326740_thumb.jpgpost-110936-0-99814300-1426326763_thumb.jpgpost-110936-0-03861500-1426326786_thumb.jpg

"As many nights endure Without a moon or star So will we endure When one is gone and far "Leonard Cohen, of blessed memory(21/09/1934-7/11/2016)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 22
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • ac12

    3

  • sidthecat

    2

  • Sailor Kenshin

    1

  • lmarine0510

    1

Yes. I have bought a few no-name Chinese pens (i.e. "Iridium Point Germany") and some 1930's vintage, no-name, lever-filling, colorful celluloid pens with "Warranted" nibs off of eBay and the majority of them turned out to be excellent writers and they make for excellent knock-about pens.

Parker 51 Aerometric (F), Sheaffer Snorkel Clipper (PdAg F), Sheaffer Snorkel Statesman (M), red striated Sheaffer Balance Jr. (XF), Sheaffer Snorkel Statesman desk set (M), Reform 1745 (F), Jinhao x450 (M), Parker Vector (F), Pilot 78g (F), Pilot Metropolitan (M), Esterbrook LJ (9555 F), Sheaffer No-Nonsense calligraphy set (F, M, B Italic), Sheaffer School Pen (M), Sheaffer Touchdown Cadet (M), Sheaffer Fineline (341 F), Baoer 388 (F), Wearever lever-filler (M).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Interesting. The pen has a Rotring-like nib.

 

I picked up a unknown plastic pen with a plunger filler. The only marking on the pen--Made in England--on the cap. It had a wonderfully smooth #2 medium stub nib by Smoothline. I ended up putting the nib in my Noodler's Nib Creeper.

 

Later found out that Conway Stewart used Smoothline in their third-tier and school pens.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That is a very nice looking pen, I would want one for myself. Especially curious about the material.

 

I don't have a lot of pens but two pens really surprised me. One was a Pelikan Pelikano P55 which had a medium nib. I was curious about the pen having seen a review of it online and I decided to buy one. The pen felt cheap in the hand and I expected it to be a bad writer too. Exactly the opposite! The nib was writing like a dream. The pen stayed in my possession for about an hour before my fiance took it for herself.

 

The other one was a Jinhao 159. I bought one of them for $9 shipped. Again, I was interested in the pen after reading reviews of it online. The similarity with the 149 was also a factor in my decision. I didn't expect it to write particularly well at all. After all it costs $9 shipped from China! I was wrong again. Amazing build quality for a pen of its price and it really has a great nib. The fate of the pen turned out to be the same as the Pelikano, girlfriend took it for herself! After that I bought 5 more of them for an even better deal $5/each shipped. I've been giving them out to people who are interested in fountain pens. A week ago I gave one of them to a co-worker and he wouldn't take it because he thought it was a very expensive pen. I assured him that it was not and he's been using that happily since.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have a tiny little piebald lever-filler with a beautiful Warranted stub nib...no markings, but furnished in good gold. No discoloration, either. It's such a cute little thing, and what a nice writer.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love that! I find no-names, or lowly names, that turn out to be great, all the time. Often they have interesting or beautiful celluloid pattern. My current fave is a no-name with elegant pearl-and-black stripes and a semi-flex nib. Really fun to write with. Some pens are so expensive/fancy that you don't want to take them out of the house because you're so worried about losing them. I love the inexpensive, non-famous ones that are no-worry daily users.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...

It happens all the time. My favorite fountain pens of all time are some piston-filler school pens I got off of ebay, three dozen for aroung $35 a dozen. Granted they don't write that well out of the box, but the nibs are semi-flex, and so can be easily tweaked to make them very wet, smooth writers. I later learned they are Universals. The world is full of dry, scratchy, overly heavy, expensive pens, and of cheap pens that write perfectly... You just have to find them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have at least seven lever-fill fountain pens that have no markings on them and are good writers. They are all probably 1950 pens and probably cost a dollar or two when new. I got them used at a thrift store for twenty-five to fifty-cents each back in the 1990's. Some of them needed considerable work on the nibs, but they all write great now.

 

I have also bought a few from this bargain bin that only contributed parts for other pens.

 

-David (Estie).

No matter how much you push the envelope, it will still be stationery. -Anon.

A backward poet writes inverse. -Anon.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've had good luck with the no-names. I just got a tiny ringtop in dark blue marbled celluloid. A tiny but very flexy Warranted nib. Needs a sac, of course, but it'll write a treat.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Several times.

In fact I enjoy looking at the "junk box," and restoring some of the pens to decent writers.

- Some times all it needs is cleaning the crud off the pen and resacing it.

- Sometime the nib needs a little bit of adjustment.

- Some nibs are broken/corroded/trashed and just need to be replaced. So I got a bunch of generic cheap Chinese nibs, that I use to renib old brand-X pens with NICE celluloid, into nice writers. The tipping technology of today is miles ahead of the tier-3 stuff they had way back then.

San Francisco Pen Show - August 28-30, 2020 - Redwood City, California

www.SFPenShow.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yep, I love my odd-ball pens. The most notable ones I found are a set of six Hero Italic pens, from 1.1 mm to 2.5 mm (or so), for less than $10.00. Another nice set was an unknown Indian set of five italic pens for, again, less than $10.00. Love tinkering and bringing a poor pen up to highly functional.

 

Money spent isn't, IMHO, a good criterion of the quality of a pen. So, by all means, take a chance on a bargain. Might work out, might not. But how else are you going to learn how to work on a pen?

 

Best of luck,

Yours,
Randal

From a person's actions, we may infer attitudes, beliefs, --- and values. We do not know these characteristics outright. The human dichotomies of trust and distrust, honor and duplicity, love and hate --- all depend on internal states we cannot directly experience. Isn't this what adds zest to our life?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, I've come across several no name vintage pens that turned out to be very special pens. Yours looks very interesting, congrats!

PAKMAN

minibanner.gif                                    Vanness-world-final.png.c1b120b90855ce70a8fd70dd342ebc00.png

                         My Favorite Pen Restorer                                             My Favorite Pen Store

                                                                                                                                Vanness Pens - Selling Online!

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I bought eight "Magnum" fountainpens by the German brand Diplomat off ebay. The model has been discontinued and it was a bulk sale, four pens for about 8 or 10€ IIRC. Apparently they were designed to compete with the Safari and Twist and similar pens for german schoolchildren. I bought four blue ones first and only then I realized the seller was also offering four black ones which looked much better, so I simply bought those too. Nice for experimenting with and comparing different inks.h

 

Great writers and have a very nice, unique feel to the nib. I use one of them for my Rohrer&Klingner "Scabiosa" iron gallus ink which I hesitated to use in my more expensive pens. It has been working extremely well so far, even though I often don't use it for weeks at a time and the Scabiosa has turned to almost-black in the inkfeed.

Edited by mhpr262
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have a number of pens of various ages with no identifying marks at all that just needed a good cleaning and either a nib adjustment or nib replacement to become very attractive, good writing pens. Boxes of cheap pens at antique stores yielded a lot of them. A few came in "lots" from eBay. Some are BHR or BCHR, some are celluloid. My oldest one is, I suspect, from the late 19th century. Repairing these little jewels is a great way to spend an afternoon.

Dave Campbell
Retired Science Teacher and Active Pen Addict
Every day is a chance to reduce my level of ignorance.

fpn_1425200643__fpn_1425160066__super_pi

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Last year I found a no-name lever filler, fitted with what turned out to maybe be an English made 14K nib. I've been told the nib is worth about 5 times what I paid for the pen....

I still have to have the pen re-sacced, but I expect it will turn out to be an amazing writer. The irony of it all was that I had made a special trip up to the antiques mall across the street and had only found a junker Wearever. So at 10 of 5, I ran across the street to the tiny place, and the guy said he didn't have any pens. But I figured that I'd poke around and see what else might be interesting before the place closed for the night.

I also have a Wearever that I was *given* by a dealer at an antiques fair a year ago May. The guy said "Oh, I think I have some pens in the truck!" and pulled out a big corrugated cardboard box, which he dug through and pulled out the Wearever. I looked it over, told him what I could (which wasn't much, knowing very little about the brand, and started to hand it back to him. He said "Keep it! I can't sell it!" (not entirely sure why not, but okay...). I had it redacted and it's not too bad a writer -- smoother than I would have expected for being a 3rd tire brand.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

"It's very nice, but frankly, when I signed that list for a P-51, what I had in mind was a fountain pen."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Got a piston filling Dollar demonstrator as a gift with purchase when I bought an Estie. WONDERFUL pen. Gave it to my girlfriend and I miss it... But she's very happy with it. It's her first fountain pen and she absolutely adores it! Smoothest nib I've ever used.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

 

Last year I found a no-name lever filler, fitted with what turned out to maybe be an English made 14K nib. I've been told the nib is worth about 5 times what I paid for the pen....

I still have to have the pen re-sacced, but I expect it will turn out to be an amazing writer. The irony of it all was that I had made a special trip up to the antiques mall across the street and had only found a junker Wearever. So at 10 of 5, I ran across the street to the tiny place, and the guy said he didn't have any pens. But I figured that I'd poke around and see what else might be interesting before the place closed for the night.

I also have a Wearever that I was *given* by a dealer at an antiques fair a year ago May. The guy said "Oh, I think I have some pens in the truck!" and pulled out a big corrugated cardboard box, which he dug through and pulled out the Wearever. I looked it over, told him what I could (which wasn't much, knowing very little about the brand, and started to hand it back to him. He said "Keep it! I can't sell it!" (not entirely sure why not, but okay...). I had it redacted and it's not too bad a writer -- smoother than I would have expected for being a 3rd tire brand.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

 

Some of the Wearevers are GREAT writers. Too bad they are looked down at by many.

I have one with a modern 'brand X' stainless steel flex nib, and it regularly surprises people.

San Francisco Pen Show - August 28-30, 2020 - Redwood City, California

www.SFPenShow.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 


Got a piston filling Dollar demonstrator as a gift with purchase when I bought an Estie. WONDERFUL pen. Gave it to my girlfriend and I miss it... But she's very happy with it. It's her first fountain pen and she absolutely adores it! Smoothest nib I've ever used.

 

That is a GREAT starter and general every day pen.

And its easy to take it completely apart to clean it, if the ink does not flush out normally.

San Francisco Pen Show - August 28-30, 2020 - Redwood City, California

www.SFPenShow.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Had to add to the reply of ac12 concerning Wearever pens.

"Some of the Wearevers are GREAT writers. Too bad they are looked down at by many.

I have one with a modern 'brand X' stainless steel flex nib, and it regularly surprises people."

 

A few weeks ago at a flea market I bought a baggie with some pens and pencils. I really only wanted one pen, but the dealer was not interested in selling separately, and the price of the whole bag was less than what i would have expected to pay for the one pen I wanted. One of the pens I had no interest in was a red cartridge filling Wearever Pioneer pen with aluminum cap. As cheap pens go, this one couldn't be much cheaper. It originally retailed for half a dollar (about $4.15 adjusted for inflation). It has a semi-hooded nib (covering a standard steel nib) with the generally hated clear plastic feed. However, IMO it is not a bad looking pen, and it had an empty cartridge inside. I decided to thoroughly flush the nib unit and the cartridge, which I then filled with a syringe. The end result is a cheap pen which behaves better than many of my "expensive" pens: has not dried out, has good flow, and a smooth, if stiff, medium nib.

 

I guess I'd have to agree!

post-265-0-78248900-1477858120_thumb.jpg

Edited by fullfederhalter
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Most Contributions

    1. amberleadavis
      amberleadavis
      43844
    2. PAKMAN
      PAKMAN
      33494
    3. Ghost Plane
      Ghost Plane
      28220
    4. inkstainedruth
      inkstainedruth
      26624
    5. jar
      jar
      26101
  • Upcoming Events

  • Blog Comments

    • Shanghai Knife Dude
      I have the Sailor Naginata and some fancy blade nibs coming after 2022 by a number of new workshop from China.  With all my respect, IMHO, they are all (bleep) in doing chinese characters.  Go use a bush, or at least a bush pen. 
    • A Smug Dill
      It is the reason why I'm so keen on the idea of a personal library — of pens, nibs, inks, paper products, etc. — and spent so much money, as well as time and effort, to “build” it for myself (because I can't simply remember everything, especially as I'm getting older fast) and my wife, so that we can “know”; and, instead of just disposing of what displeased us, or even just not good enough to be “given the time of day” against competition from >500 other pens and >500 other inks for our at
    • adamselene
      Agreed.  And I think it’s good to be aware of this early on and think about at the point of buying rather than rationalizing a purchase..
    • A Smug Dill
      Alas, one cannot know “good” without some idea of “bad” against which to contrast; and, as one of my former bosses (back when I was in my twenties) used to say, “on the scale of good to bad…”, it's a spectrum, not a dichotomy. Whereas subjectively acceptable (or tolerable) and unacceptable may well be a dichotomy to someone, and finding whether the threshold or cusp between them lies takes experiencing many degrees of less-than-ideal, especially if the decision is somehow influenced by factors o
    • adamselene
      I got my first real fountain pen on my 60th birthday and many hundreds of pens later I’ve often thought of what I should’ve known in the beginning. I have many pens, the majority of which have some objectionable feature. If they are too delicate, or can’t be posted, or they are too precious to face losing , still they are users, but only in very limited environments..  I have a big disliking for pens that have the cap jump into the air and fly off. I object to Pens that dry out, or leave blobs o
  • Chatbox

    You don't have permission to chat.
    Load More
  • Files






×
×
  • Create New...