I have a nice early (1910s?) black rubber eyedropper I recently bought.

Unfortunately the section is very tightly screwed or pushed into the barrel. I've seen some that had an end cap that was removable to fill, but this one doesn't have that and the only parting line is where a more modern section would be, so that must be the intended way to fill it.

I hesitate to try too hard to unscrew it for fear of breaking it, as these pens can be pretty brittle. Does anyone have any tried and true tricks of persuasion? Like warm water, or a waft or two with a heat gun, or....TNT.....

Don't use warm water - it will turn that Black hard rubber to Olive green in no time.

John

Your going to have to use a bit of heat to relax the barrel. I don't recomend open flame on BHR pens at any time. Use a heat gun on this one. After it's warm to the touch give it a gentle but semi firm twist & I'm willing to bet it'll open right up for you.

This is just a guess but I'm willing to bet it's frozen with dried ink on the threads. Thats generally what I find in a case like this. Good luck & be careful. If your not comfortable doing this one yourself send it off to a reairman like me, Ron, Richard, Tom or Joel Hamilton that have experience with these sort of problems.

Dennis

Thanks Dennis.

I'll give it a gentle try with a heat gun. May I assume that all eyedropper pens were fitted with threaded joints, not slip joints?

I shall be suitably conservative with both amount of heat and force used. It is a lovely pen and I don't want to damage it.

No problem bud, glad to help out.

Slow & gradual is the way to go on BHR pens (well... any pens for that matter).

Off the top of my head i can't think of any ED pens with a slip section, so i'll give a yes it's got a threadded section.

Cheers
Dennis

There may be some eyedropper pens with slip joints. The Parker Jointless pen had a slip joint of sorts, though the design did not have a seam on the exterior of the barrel -- the nib/feed assembly was friction-fitted and was designed to be pulled out to allow the user to fill the barrel. Waterman patented a slip-joint eyedropper, but I've not seen any evidence that it was produced.

--Daniel

J. G. Rider also made a jointless eyedropper pen of the "pull out the nib and feed" style. I think there may have been a couple of other smaller companies that did as well.

John

Argh.

Well the hair dryer didn't do it.

I hesitate to hit it with the heat gun out in the garage, and I gather soaking it is a no no. I had hoped that a session in the ultrasonic bath might have loosened things up without discolouring the BCHR - would it really be a risk for 2-3 minutes in water?

One second in water is all it will take to carry away the pigment that is loosely held in the compromised outer layer of the hard rubber.

Don't do it.

--Daniel

I'm doing a reblackening job later today. To prep the surface i have to clean the pen with soap & water to remove all of the dirt & squag thats built up on it. I'll post some pics of what it looks like afterward.

Seriously, unless your getting it reblackened after, water is the fastest way to K/O your pens finish.

Got it - I won't.

Too bad that the rather handy method of ultrasonic cleaning is unavailable for BCHR materials, as it sure ungunks regular pens nicely.

Will continue with the heat approach - gingerly.

I have a limited experience, but I have had good results with chemical shake-and-warm hand warmers. They don't heat up too much and you can wrap them around the area that you want to heat. up.

I finally got that Salz BHR reblacking job finished.

Part of the surface prep is removing all of the dirt, gunge and oils from the surface. The best way i've found is to wash it well with warm soapy dawn dishwashing liquid.

Water and HR should never meet unless your going to redo the surface color, because this is what happens to it.....









HOWEVER, it's worth the pain of seeing it like that when you get results like this.....












The white specks on the pen is dust I didn't get blown off when i shot the pics.

Great little pen with a super flexi nib, too bad there is a tiny chip out of the threads.

I used Syd's Pensburymanor Black Hard Rubber Pen Potion #9. I have to tell ya kids this stuff just flat out kicks ***. I love it.

Yes, I used this in my repair DVD's but, I don't get anything from Syd for the product endorsement. I'm just a very happy user.

Dennis

Very nice job Dennis.

Gerry

Any luck with organic based penetrant sprays like WD40 (Lanolin based, I think) for loosening recalcitrant sections, or is heat the only way?