Hey all.

Just filled up my new 51 aero with Parker Quink black and.... a feint greyish line came out on my paper. After leaving it for a minute and getting the same problem again I switched to Waterman blue-black. Again, only a weak line came out. Strange thing is that if I turn the pen upside down it writes perfectly.

Any idea as to how I can correct this? I"m pretty sure its easily solvable, but I dont know how to take my 51 apart

Did you flush the pen out real good... I mean multiple times. I have found that it can take 6-7 times to flush out a 51 properly. And even then you may still need to take off the hood and clean the collector, feed and nib of dried ink (thank you RonZ for pointing that out).
After the pen has been flushed and refilled, it can sometimes take a while for the collector to completely fill with ink and produce a good solid line. I have has 51 that I flushed, UCed and dried then filled and it did not write as dark as the ink was supposed to for an hour or so....
Richard once told me to stay away from Parker Quink Black... I was having problems with a 51 that was not writing well with it. He said the Washable Blue was fine, but he will never use the black.

Well I've emptied the pen of quink. I'll fill the it up with the diamine ive got ordered to arrive tomorrow. Unfortunately, in the process of checking the collecter I misaligned the nib Luckily I used my grandpa's old diamond magnifier to correct it

Thanks for the advice Gritz

Parker sometimes adjusted the nib to be a bit on the dry side, and sometimes the slit in the nib needs to be opened up a bit. But I think that your sentence there is the clue to the problem.

The hood of a 51 is part of the flow control of the pen. If it's too loose, the pen can have too wet of a line. Too tight, and the line is too dry. Turning the pen upside down to write pushes the nib away from the hood and allows more ink to flow, therefore you get a wetter line.

I'm not being coy here, but this is one case where I would rather not try to explain how to adjust the hood on a 51. It's not hard to do, but it's easy to screw things up in the process. And you may have to play around with things to get the flow just right.

I can do this, and I am sure that Richard can as well. I simply don't know if others have the experience or not.

For what it's worth: as one who has fooled with adjusting the flow on Parker "51" (vacumatic) nibs, I have to agree with Ron. I have had some limited success, but I'm nowhere near experienced enough to consistantly do an excellent job. I don't mind continuing to practice because if I screw up a shell, I have spares....

I should add that the Parker "51" can be a sweet writer when properly adjusted.

Steve

the fix for poor flow is illustrated in both da book and the parker service manual--just follow heating instructions, no need for hood disassemly. alcohol lamp is needed.

Heat gun might be a better way to go (safer than an open flame).

Gerry

A bit of a question in regards to this- Clarification here- I'm not going to do this, certainly not right now- my suggestion is that for this type of work it be sent away...

I'm a bit confused as to how getting the tip of the shell closer to the nib improves flow... I would think it hinders flow... I too have a slightly dry writer... a bit of a gentle push with my fingernail on the top of the nib gets the flow going very nicely... so either the nib needs a bit of cleaning and I'm merely separating the tines, or the shell is too close to the nib... regardless, before adjustment, I'm guessing a proper cleaning is appropriate.

If you guys prefer to discuss this via pm, please feel free! I just never really got the proper shell movement to increase -v- decrease flow... my understanding is that the shell also acts as a surface for ink to flow across?

Thanks for any thoughts!
-Allen

Well, without getting too detailed, the general principles are:

Ink flow is determined by nib to feed spacing, nib tine spacing, and in the case of the 51, nib to hood spacing. Of course, blocked feed channels air return channels and air leaks also play a part, but for pens in good condition, the first items I mentioned are the determining factors.

Ink is delivered to the tip of the nib by capillary action, so if the spacing is too wide, it can't 'wick' to where its needed.

After the spacing is closed to the critical point where the ink flows freely (usually the wettest flow), further narrowing of the space restricts the ink flow and it becomes a dryer writer.

In the 51, the hood/nib area is like the feed/nib area of other pens - it is used to deliver the ink to the nib by capilliary action, hence it's spacing is important - as is the tine spacing.

Writing upside down with the pen tends to push the tines closer together, and increase the hood to tine spacing. If the flow improves, this is what you want to do as an adjustment. If the flow improves when you press harder on the nib in the normal position, you'll want to spread the tines a little, or decrease the hood/nib spacing to improve flow.

Of course, experience is *very* useful in determining the adjustments to make, how much adjusting to do, and potentially how much damage is done if carried out indiscriminately...

Does that help?

Regards,

Gerry

What I have found in connection with this topic, that when you clean the pen, you have to floss the nib slit. It seems that like the illustration that Ron put up a while back about taking a "51" apart to properly clean it, the nib slit can get this almost solid gunk in it that only flossing is going to shift. Now I just take the very gentle approach and use a piece of 35mm film, sans emulsion.

The second thing I have found with bad writing "51"s is that the nib is deformed rather than bent. It would seem that over the years, a heavy hand can bend the nib tip up and then if it has been used by a right handed writer, the nib gets a real bias to the left. So the nib ends up with the tip bent up and to the left. Correcting this, which you can only do with the nib right out of the pen, then aligning the tips and smoothing the result, as the act of bending the nib back will mess up the writing surface, has for me returned a poor writing "51" to an excellent writer.

Now as this is based on a massive sample size of THREE pens, one English Medium almost broad, one US Medium and one English Fine, it is not a definitive sample by any measure. But, it has worked for me, but each one has taken me many man hours, the pen has to become my daily writer whilst I adjust and fiddle until I get it writing wet and even with just the lightest touch.

As to adjusting the hood, I have found that a quick dip in very hot water, is enough to mould the plastic, but I have only had to do this once and that was with a pen that I built from a batch of old parts, so those pieces had never been together so they needed a bit of encouragement to settle in nicely.

My final words on this would be that for a novice, the "51" is a very easy and robust pen to work on, and if you really screw up, then you can get spare parts. But don't try this with your most treasured pen, buy a few gash examples and have a play.

Jim

Good points Jim, and since lucite is impervious to water, the hot water softening tip is probably the safest advice given. You can heat up a cup of water in the microwave, and use a thermometer to determine the temp. No chance of hood flambé...

Good point re the flossing - I usually use brass shim stock, but the 35mil film is great too.

If anyone has a general guide to the temp necessary to mould the hood without damaging the plastic I would appreciate hearing it.

Regards,

Gerry

PS: Ron's point of not giving directions because bad results can happen is spot on. Don't venture into this area with a valuable or heirloom pen. But if you have a user you are not worried about ready for sacr.... .. an educational experience, these methods can be tried and should allow you to improve the ink flow.

Gerry,

Based on the fact that water in a mug in the Microwave boils at 100C, then by the time I get settled in my work area the water is probably down to 95/98C ish? Then I dip the hood for about 15 secs then try and mold, then dip mold, dip mold until it seems to be about right, then a dip in cool water to set it.

So my guess is that I am getting the hood to 80C give or take 10%.

Again this is totally unscientific and is based on the total sum of ONE black pen that I have published pictures of here several times, 'cos I was so damned chuffed about it

Jim

These are wonderful an excellent discussions, guys! I really appreciate it! And no better place than the Repair QandA I think for this type of talk. I understood this a bit, from my read of DaBook, but it was very helpful to hear about how you guys go about this.

I *completely* understand the dangers here, and won't attempt any of this with a pen that I'd be sad to hurt. It is my hope that everyone reading this forum will take this wise advice from these experienced repairers!

Thanks a *ton* for this discussion, everyone! I'm likely going to be taking apart my user-51 and see if I can't clean up the feed assembly, nib etc., But, first I need to get some parts. I will likely focus on proper cleaning etc., and reassembly to see how it influences flow, and if things need some tweeking, then I'll decide on that when the time comes.

Thanks for all the wonderful pointers and discussion guys!! [Also interesting to note how use affects a nib! Very cool!]

My best, guys!!
-Allen