I have just received an old Majestic fountain pen that I got for about $10 on e-bay. It came as an old dirty pen. However, after polishing the nib, I discovered that it's 14K gold - shines like new. Its sac is OK, there were no leaks when I filled it with water.

Sincerely, I don't know much about the lever filling system. Do I need to pull it once to fill up the pen, or I need to do it several times? What's the best way to clean the dry old ink inside the pen? What is the best way to remove the rust from its clasp?

And the last but not the least - what is the history of this fountain pen? There are words on the nib: "14K MADE IN USA", and on the clasp: "MAJESTIC".

Please, help.

Good Morning Rita,

I will let the professionals answer your repair questions. I do suspect that unless the pen was serviced in the recent past that the sac needs to be replaced. To get to the inside of the barrel, you will need to remove the section. A good place to start with your research is to look at the reference section at richardspens.com. Richard Binder is a member here who has a very comprehensive website dedicated to information on vintage pens. He is also a pen repair specialist.

As to the history of your pen - I am attaching a picture from a 1945 Sears Catalog which indicates that they sold Majestic Pens at that time. I am not sure who manufactured Majestics, but possibly a Chicago based pen manufacturer as Sears was headquartered there. I am also not sure if they were only available through Sears, but this gives you a bit of a timeline.



Have a great time with your pen...

Phil

Hello, Rita,

I have a Majestic here that I found at a yard sale a couple of years ago. It has a "butterfly" point and a visulated section. It needed a new sac when I got it. The section on mine is not threaded into the barrel.

If the sac is OK, you can clean the old ink out by operating the lever and filling it repeatedly with water. Invert the full pen a few times to make sure you rinse the entire sac out. Do that until the water runs clear and you should be good to go.

You only need to operate the lever once to fill the pen. Lift the lever until it is perpendicular to the barrel, immerse the entire nib and part of the section in ink, flip the lever back down into its barrel slot, and wait ten seconds. Remove the pen from the ink and wipe the section and nib with a tissue.

If you ever need to have a lever filler to be super full - I mean, full right up to the gills, fill it once the normal way and then hold the pen nib-up and tap it a couple of times to get the air bubble in the sac to come to the top. Then slooooowly and carefully lift the lever until you see ink well up around the base of the nib. Then dip the nib and section into the ink again and lower the lever. It is best to do this over the sink and wear rubber gloves! (and maybe a raincoat)

Rusty clasp? Cleaning methods depend on how much rust there is and how deep into the metal it goes. If there are just a few, small, lightly rusted places, you can scrape them gently with a screwdriver blade, being careful not to scratch the good places. If it is rusted pretty much all over and there is not enough original finish left to bother with, I would use some fine steel wool, followed by polishing compound (plain white toothpaste works well sometimes).

Paddler

Paddler covered it well and it's as easy as that. If you plan on buying more vintage pens, I would (and have) invest in some Simichrome Polish for the clasps, clips, bands and barrel/cap of a pen and a good Sunshine Jewelry Polishing Cloth for the nib. You won't be dissapointed.

I've gotten a few Majestic pens lately, they range from useless to pretty nice upon arrival, depending on the condition of the (steel or 14k gold) nib. One favorable aspect of the Majestic is it is a rather pretty celluloid pen for dirt cheap; if you need to replace the nib, go ahead and do it.

They're great pens to learn repair/restoration on. The gold flashing on the clip and lever is very thin; one polishing job and it's gone, but Simichrome does wonders for spiffing up the body and cap. It'll look like a new pen when you're done with it. I've learned a little bit about nib adjustment on my Majestics, bending and warping the nibs around in ways I wouldn't dare try on a Waterman or Eversharp, and now I'm not so shy in working on my other pens.

Phil,

Thank you very much. I will use your instructions and the link. My pen is in the middle of the upper row - B - in the catalog page you provided. I am so grateful to you for that page.

Rita

You are very welcome.

As Robert says in the post above yours - these are good pens to learn repairs on.

Enjoy ---

Phil

Thanks, Paddler,

I followed your directions, except the rubber gloves and the raincoat. Now, my fingers are all inky, but I don't mind. I have filled it with my favorite blue ink mix (PR Tanzanite and Dapne Blue, 1:2). It writes very well with its fine flexible nib. I can't imagine that this pen is older than me and writes so good. I can forgive a little bit rust on it. The ink flow is too generous, a small ink puddle is getting formed on the nib - is it normal?

I got a special kit (Never Wax Your Car Again!), with special polymer coatings and metal polishes, at the last LA car show. I use it with my pens and they all look sharp. My Majestic is a very nice looking pearly pen now, except for some rust leftovers that are not so easy to remove. I will work more on it.

Thank you, Rita

Robert,

What is about the ink flow in your Majestics? The nib in mine is in a very good condition, but it looks that its flow is too high. I soaked it overnight in dishwashing soap solution, may be it's the problem.

Rita

My Majestics are very wet writers also. My guess is that the heavy ink flow stems from two material quality-related issues: the cheap nibs may be bent back (and perhaps tines spread) a touch from enthusiastic use, and 2) the section feed may be misaligned or warped due to aging of the hard rubber. I have remedied one pen's overly-wet flow by removing the nib and squeezing the tines closer together.

And (someone makes a reference to just this problem on another post) according to "Da Book" you can adjust ink flow by heating the section feed with a hair dryer for a few seconds to bend it back closer into its original position. I haven't tried this second method, but considering that hard rubber shrinks with age it makes sense that the feed is shrinking away from the nib, encouraging more ink flow.

Nice pen Here is one I had long time ago...

<img src="http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b325/azavalia/DCP_1592_50.jpg">

And another, without the beautiful calligraphy of antoniosz

My 14 K nib seems in a perfect condition. It's the feed problem. I will have to try the hair dryer method.
Thank you for your very good advise.

That's my pen!!! Thanks for the picture.

Rita

This one is cool too. I will have to watch e-bay to get one like that. Those Majestics have very nice flexible nibs, which are hard to find nowadays in cheap pens.

Thanks for the photos, gents. Except for the clips, those pens look a lot like a couple of Truepoints I have, which are a Sears exclusive brand. Might point me a little closet to the manufacturer.



I am pretty sure that Majestic was not a Sears exclusive, though I wouldn't put money on it. I don't think that they appear in that many catalogs. Also, not sure that we should put too much into the Chicago hypothesis - after all the Stratford next to it is a Salz product from New York, and they sold Wearevers from New Jersey. But I am speculating as much as anything. Sears also sold a bunch of cheap Ambassadors a little earlier in the 30s. Bruce Speary has opined that Ambassador was a J Harris trademark, but I am not sure his basis for that.

Is that the Fall 1945 catalog? I have not seen the Spring of 45 catalog, but the Fall of '44 doesn't have any fountain pens listed - they are part of a long list of items that are not available due to the manufacturers converting to war-time production. Thanks for posting that one, though - we have got to find a way to get a good library of Sears pen catalog pages online.

Good luck with getting this one to behave. You might also want to check out Don Fluckinger's articles in his "Joy of Junk" series - Don Fluckinger - Extra Fine Points for some more perspectives on these 3rd tier pens.

John

And Phil - does that snake-skin have a big wide band that has two black painted stripes to make it look like 3 bands when it is only one? Another similarity to my Truepoints. . . the plot thickens. . .

John

When I googled "Majestic fountain pen", I found a lot sites with information about Ambassadors. Maybe there is some hidden relationship between the two brands.

Yes, it is one wide band made to look like three. As to the catalog, this is a page from the 1945 Christmas Catalog. And like you, I have never seen Majestics in other catalogs from Sears.

Rita, after rereading all of the posts I am wondering if the reason for the ink problems might be a faulty sac. If this pen has not had the sac replaced, that might be your problem. Just a thought. To check that you would have to remove the section. On these pens, it is a friction fit.

Just a thought....

Who would have thought we could devote so much time to Majestics?

philm

Rita,

A generous flow is a generous flow, but puddles are not allowed. There may be an air leak somewhere. The sac probably has a small hole in it.

You folks have some really pretty Majestics there! Mine is plain black with the original owner's name engraved in the barrel.

Paddler