Hi all,

I have the Cross Solo FP in shinu black with gold trim with an EF & F nib. I wanted to get the roller ball & ball point set as well but have been told the line is no longer in production. If so I have tried ebay etc various retail & online pen shops but to no avail. Shame as out of all my FPs the cross is the most confortable and reliable. Considering I have a range from Waterman's to Cross CII, Parkers & MB that is a great accolade!

Regards

I have them all!!! Bwwwwwwwaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhaaaaaa

Actually I noticed that there were getting harder to find on even fleabay so I picked up as many colors as I could get. I even have a couple of frankenpens that were not comercially produced. Some were not available in the US, and what seems to be filtering down is the old backroom stock.

As I understand it, they quit making them quite a while ago. The reason that there seemed to be so many of 'em on eBay was because Cross had grossly overestimated the market for the custom silkscreened pens (i.e., medical reps, pharma sales, etc.). For a while there, the most popular colors to be had on eBay were the white ones and/or the green ones. Great pens!

I've come across quite a lot of solos in India. I bought a black GT solo last week for about $30.

About ten years ago I bought yellow Solo BPs at local dollar store for $3 or so. I gave away a few and kept one for myself.

Hi,

They do turn up from time to time on ebay, I'm sure that somewhere a couple of months ago there was a post about a new Cross pen which was basically a revamped Solo, can't find it and can't remember what it was called.

Not much help am I.

Andy

I think they quit making, actually importing from the subcontractor Pilot, the fountain pen a decade or so ago, more or less..... As far as the BP, I believe they kept that on a bit longer for their oem advertising pen business. I thought I noticed bulk printers of advertising pens still had the Solo BP in inventory up to last year, maybe plus a few months.

Nice pen, but a market failure. Might be one of the reasons Cross seems to avoid plastic bodied pens and the lowend FP market these days. To bad, I would really like a lucite bodied & capped Black or Brown GT Townsend.

So that's why I had to go all the way to ebay.com.au to get a broad green example . As far as I am able to tell, the nib is identical to my Pilot Lucina, but the pen itself is not so nice looking as the Lucina (though it came with a piston filler which the Pilot did not).

I own one Solo. That's plenty for me. Metal is where it is at for me.

Two of them here. Both superdooper writers. Great pens.

I have a full set in Blue with GT (FP/BP/MP and Selectapoint), also an FP in Light Blue with Black Trim and somewhere a translucent green BP which came with a matching swiss army knife.

Very good pens for the price.

Was the replacement/remake called the Radiance, or something similar, I think they were only on sale in the US.

Andy

FWIW, Not sure but...... I think the black trimmed ones were the OEM units for imprinting and the gold trimmed were the retail line.

From what I can make out, the "hierarchy" goes:

Solo (various colors, black trim, single flush cap band)
Solo Classic (ebony/navy/forest/burgundy, 23k plated trim, single flush cap band)
Solo Classic Radiance (same colors and plating as above, raised "double" cap band -- similar to Townsend's, but larger)

The "Classic" and "Radiance" seem to have the same SKU numbers, and the box that my "Radiance" came in simply identifies it as a "Solo Classic". I'd like to know the timeline of these pens -- the one on the Cross website isn't that great.

-- Brian