I just received my first Parker 61 and am having trouble filling it. The seller said he'd been using Montblanc blue black so I tried to fill with the same ink. Any suggestions?
Thanks, Nathan.

How are you trying to fill it? Is it a capillary filler or one of the later more conventional fillers?

You might try using an ear syringe to flush all the old ink out of the pen if it's a capillary filler. Cut the nozzle on the ear syringe back until you can fit it over the fill end of the 61, and push two or three bulb loads of water through the pen. Then wrap the pen in a paper towel and give it a "thermometer shake" (nib down) until you get all the water and remaining ink out of the pen. You might have to change paper towels once or twice. Be careful not to lose your grip on the pen, and not to strike the pen against anything while you are flinging the ink into the paper towel. When I say "thermometer shake" I mean use a full arm swing down, hard.

You might also need to soak the nib for a bit in a glass of water (this could cause the arrow to fall off -- if it does, use a very small amount of two-part epoxy to reattach it after you dry the section off), then flush again.

After all this, refill the pen. Instructions are on Richard Binder's Web site (www.richardspens.com) in the Reference Info section, under "Fountain Pen Filling Systems".

I use only Quink Washable Blue in my 61. It seems to work better than other inks in the 61, and to be less prone to drying out and clogging the pen. It is also very good at cleaning old ink out of pens.

This may just be my biases talking, but I would never ever use Montblanc ink in a 61.

As BilltheEditor says, it's difficult to make suggestions without knowing which type of 61 it is. Could be clogged through any one of a number of reasons and the solution will be dependant on whether it's a convertor or capilliary fill.

Regards

Richard.

Montblanc Blue Black is a permanent ink, in that it has ferro gallic components. That implies that there is iron particles in suspension in the ink. This is not a good thing for a 61.

Follow the advice of those posters above, then use a nice safe ink which has little to no solids in suspension. Most manufacturers ink is very safe for 61's, you just happened to pick the one which is probably least well suited to use in your model pen.

Cheers,
Sean

Thanks you all. I appologize for not metioning that it is a capilary fill. My intention is to change to a different ink, probably Waterman. I need to clean the pen before I do that. Initially I was trying to test the pan and make sure it worked. Nathan.

The first time I filled the '61' I held the capillary filler into the ink for 90 seconds or so. I thought that seemed like a long time, but I think it was not. It wrote very well for a week or so and then I neglected to write with the pen for two, maybe three days. When I picked it up again, it went totally dry and scratchy. Two or three days made that much difference!

However, after I gave it a thorough flush and clean, and let it sit to dry for a day, I then filled it by holding the filler in the ink for a full four minutes. Since then I haven't had any trouble with it, even when I've let it go unused for several days. To refill I only need to give it 90 seconds. If it's well-primed, it'll be very good to you.

My advice is to do just what I did: clean it thoroughly, and then give the first filling an extra-long time to soak up the ink.

And as others have said... get that iron gall away from your '61'!

I wanted to thank you all. With your help my 61 is working great. Nathan