I have a DJ in red, and I've just noticed the cap has two air holes. One's aligned with the clip, and one's 90 degrees round the side.

Is this normal? It's the only DJ I have andit's a pretty difficult thing to tell from pictures.

I have two model J's in front of me and they both have air holes same as yours above. Do you mean "SJ"?

DJ for double jewel. My SJ only has one hole, which got me thinking in the first place.

So, both of them have two air holes? That's odd. I wonder why...

My guess is the size. Being the SJ is smaller I assume it will displace less air when screwing the cap on so one air hole works

Well, my red transitional J (SJ as you say) has two holes in the cap.

I wouldn't make much out of the number and position of the breather holes on the caps unless you want to collect variants. (My usual disclaimer needs to go here--no two esterbrooks have ever been found to be the same. Put another way, there is no complete collection of Esterbrook pens.) I grabbed a box full of Js and found mostly two holes at about 90 degrees. I found one with two holes at about 180 degrees, one with no holes and one with a single hole. I even found one that must have been a chain pen with a jumbo hole. Not scientific in any way but I quickly convinced myself there wasn't a pattern and quit looking.

Perhaps there is something to the location and number of holes but right now I can't think of anything other than usual manufacturing mis-cues.

Todd

I notice the same irregularities as FarmBoy/Todd. It is interesting that there doesn't seem a difference when we use them, though.