I'm about to settle into my first fountain pen, and was wondering how often those among the FPN crowd cleaned and/or flushed their pens. Of course, being the nit that I am, I'd probably clean it stem to stern each time I ink it, but I've also been told it's a good idea to empty, clean, and refill the pen once every month or so, regardless of whether it is out of ink or not.

Is this more leaning toward the one or two month mark? Is it better to partially load the pen to begin with, as opposed to potentially wasting so much ink?

As an aside, I'm curious about nib cleaning. On the piston filler I'm getting, the nib needs to be submerged up to the section to fill it. This indicates to me that a lot of ink will work its way into all the fine (and not so fine) crevices in and around the nib. The groves/ribs -- for lack of a better descriptor -- on the underside of the nib look like they would be particularly difficult to clean out. Any comment on this?

How often one cleans his or her pens is really up to them, really.

For example, if you buy a piano, the seller will say: "Tune it once every twelve months for the best performance".

Similarily, some people will say: "Clean your pen once a month for the best performance".

In my mind, both of these are excessive. At most, I will clean...and I mean REALLY CLEAN...my pens, perhaps three times a year. I know, I apologise for the people who have now suffered heart-attacks and are being rushed to hospital, but I just don't see it as being necessary. Every few refills, I'll just give it a flush and clean. But normally I don't. If it's working fine, I'll leave it alone.

I agree with Shangas that cleanign/flushing habits are as individual as any other aspect of pen useage. All I can do is state what I do personally. I use my pens in a monthly rotation. I flush my pens to some degree every time I change ink during the month. If I am using bullet proof ink, I flush the pen fairly well between ink changes. At the end of my pen rotation cycle, I flush the pen out well for storeage.

After I refill a pen, I rinse the nib and lower section under a light drizzle of water. I have yet to experience any large build up of ink in the areas between the nib and section.

How long does a fresh refill generally last on a fine-nib piston filler? I know a lot is dependent on writing habits and the particular pen, but ballparks?

It really depends. I doubt anyone could give you a real answer. But a filled pen should be able to last anywhere from at least a week to a month or more.

Every pen apart from my Waterman Junior, which requires a refuelling every second day. It lays down a line wetter than a leaking oil-tanker.

---

The 'grooves' underneath the nib is the feed. A simple dabble with a tissue-paper will suck out all the excess ink. And a good wipe-down and swaddling will clean the nib & feed up pretty good.

If Shangas' response induced heart failure, then I fear mine will lead to debilitating central nervous system disorders. I flush and clean a pen when I switch from one ink to another, for the obvious reason that I do not want to perform ink mixing experiments in the pen barrel.

However, on pens in which I keep the same ink I rarely completely empty the pen. As it runs low or even dry I top it off. I have had Aurora Blue in my Namiki Impressions for the better part of seven years. I have probably cleaned and flushed it in that time span maybe a handful of times. Never once have I experienced poor performance, clogging, etc.

Same for an Aurora Optima that was filled (horror of horrors) with Parker Penman Emerald continuously for about three or four years, then another three or four with a 50/50 mix of Penman Emerald/Private Reserve Sherwood Green. Incidentally, the ink view window was never stained by these highly saturated inks.

The only pens in which I experienced trouble with this method were an early Parker Sonnet and a Waterman Phileas. The Sonnet's well documented air-leak cap troubles led to ink precipitates on the nib/feed due to water evaporation, so it really was not a lack of flushing/cleaning, but a design problem. The Phileas sat unused a bit too long with PR D.C. Supershow Blue in it and needed a good flush and refill. This was also not really a flush/clean problem, but a lack of use problem.

As for cleaning the nib after filling. I usually touch the nib and feed to the bottle edge to wick off excess ink, then I dab them with a cotton cloth to remove any remaining excess ink. Oh, and after filling my piston fill pens I release four or five drops of ink back into the bottle, then turn the pen nib up and close the piston, this will help clear ink from the feed.

I think the most important thing is to clean out your pen when you aren't going to be using it. If you are using it regularly, the ink will stay wet and the pen should remain mostly clean.

I clean the pen when I get it and then typically, I will clean and flush when said pen comes out of rotation. An average rotation time for a pen is 2 weeks in my breifcase and 4-6 weeks in "storage".

When I get a bug up my bum to change inks. Eventually, I'll have a pen for each ink, so I'll probably never bother to really give them a good cleaning unless I leave one for so long (say, years stored in my attic) that it dries up. Don't ask me how I know this...

So, in other words, I probably shouldn't worry about marking my calender for cleaning days?

Same here. Here's how I use my pens: I have a bunch of pens inked, maybe 7-10 depending on whether I've received a new pen recently (new pens get inked right away regardless of how many pens are already inked at the time). When one of them runs out of ink, I flush and clean it, get another pen from the collection, ink that to take the other pen's place. Occasionally I'd get bored with a certain pen/ink combo and dump the remaining ink back in the bottle, flush out the pen, and not replace it unless removing it from rotation takes the number of inked pens down below 6.

So in short, my pens get flushed out at least once every ink refill. And it probably takes at least a month before they're back in rotation again, so that works out nicely to about once a month, I guess.

LOL... no! Even if you decide to clean your pen once a month, it's only a rough estimate and doesn't have to be accurate. I mean, your pen won't get mad at you if you clean it a day or even a week late. At least, I think most pens won't... I've heard some can be pretty demanding

How often do i flush?

Not very often. If i've been using red ink or an iron gall ink AND i'm going to be putting the pen away for a while, i might flush it -- if i remember.

I think too much flushing/cleaning puts unecessary wear and tear on the pen. And how often do we read stories like "i was flushing out my burgundy VacMax with a flex nib when it slipped out of my hands and..."

I flush my pens, and let them air dry for 24 hours, every time I want to use a different color ink, or when I plan to store the pen without ink. I will also flush a pen if it seems to be performing poorly.

Gaggh, gaggghh, gaggghh ... [Me having heart attack and nervous system failure]

Just kidding -

I clean out my pens whenever I change them, which can be a week, a few weeks, or even a couple of months.

The important thing is to clean the pens out every once in a while and always before storing them for a while. Same goes when changing inks, for obvious reasons.

One useful tool for that is to buy a little plastic bulb used for cleaning babies' ears (I think) so that you can flush the nib well, especially if using converters or cartridges that don't allow you to push much water through the nib at one time. Just remember to flush only with cold water (some people do it with lukewarm water, but it's not necessary).

Common sense and not being too anal about it are the most important things to keep in mind.

Enjoy your pen(s)!

Erick

This is a good mantra. I have a tendency to over-analize everything. In some cases, it has proven detrimental to the given task/hobby/obsession at hand.

Alas, I know what you mean. Join the club! Lots of folks like that in these here parts...actually, I learn a lot from them much of the time.

Erick

Well, I guess I'm a nut job, but I flush my pens every time I fill them, which is probably at least once a week if not every couple days. Now granted, I change ink colors every time that I load one up and I only fill a converter not a vac but my thought is that the more water I put through the pen the less likely I am to collect sediment and dried ink in it and it only takes a couple minutes extra so, why not. After cleaning pens left with ink in them for years without a cleaning I would rather err on the side of overdoing it than under doing it.

I'll confess: I have a pen that's had the same ink in it for three months (though it's on its second fill) and it works like a champ.

Heck, I have some that haven't been cleaned for nearly a year. If I use them every day and fill with the same ink, they don't seem to need it. Of course, if I am changing ink color or if one seems somewhat clogged, I clean it before refilling.