Hi all,

I had a thread going in the Writing Instruments forum, and they advised that I come here for further guidance. I bought a new Rotring Core last week, and found that when writing with the supplied cartridge I got a lot of blank strokes. I was advised on the other thread (you can read it here) to flush out the pen, as that had helped some other people.

Unfortunately, the I think the converter is broken. I have to try really REALLY hard to advance the piston down, and so far I haven't been able to apply enough torque to make the piston come back up again (even when using a pair of pliers to hold it). If this were a metal screw in a metal hole, I'd say it had galled. Should I just try and get Rotring to send me a new converter, or is there something I can try first?

That certainly sounds like a problematic converter, putting it mildly. I would contact the seller first, then Rotring, to have it exchanged.

HTH, warm regards, Wim

The solution I used, as hinted at in that other thread, was to use a toothpick to lay some silicon grease on the walls just ahead of the gasket (a very little bit), then advance the piston into the lubricant. If it doesn't run back smoothly after that, it might be worth trying to warm some of the grease so it will pour down the shaft of the piston and get both the threads and the upper side of the gasket.

This all presupposes access to appropriate silion grease and a desire to spend a LOT of effort on fixing the thing yourself.

I do enjoy fixing things, but I don't have any grease. I'll send an email to the vendor to see what they'll do. But since it was only $10 to begin with I don't really feel too bad about it not being perfect. I guess this is a good excuse to try out a different pen and see how it compares.

convertors are cheap, just get it exchanged for a working one if the pen worked fine. Your liable to get a pen that doesn't write as well as you liked the first time around.