Hi,
I just got an oversize Vac with a thoroughly locked down lockdown filler. Everything I've read says that along with patience, soaking usually helps unlock these. Okay, in plain water? soapy water? in an ultrasonic? for ten minutes? for an hour? until the cows come home?

And is there anything in there that would conflict with soaking and patience? In other words, if it sits wet overnight, will something in there begin to corrode? I know the outside is aluminum, but I don't know what's inside.

Thanks in advance for any advice!
Gretchen

careful with ultrasound because cavitation desintegrates aluminum (not kiddin!) if you decide to give it a go with an ultrasonic cleaner don't leave it until the cows come, if you have a cheap small cleaner you can watch it thru one cycle, if you have a larger, more powerful industrial cleaner you don't want your filler to spend more than a few seconds there.

If the diaphragm was out and some ink got to the filler it might be corroded.

The spring. I wouldn't soak a speedline or lockdown filler - the spring would rust.

Thank you both!

No aluminum will be fed to the ultrasound.

And yes, since I have never, to my knowledge at least, seen an aluminum spring, that's the part I was most concerned about. So how do I convince the little darling to unlock, and what's most likely causing it to be stuck? I've not been at all forceful with it because I don't want to destroy it, and I've not yet had one apart, so I don't have a clear sense of what's likely going on with it. I just got the wonderful Pen Repair book by Jim Marshall and Laurence Oldfield, and it does show all the parts on page 62, but I don't know how or where the little tiny metal piece with a notch in it fits, or the bit of circular something that I'm guessing sits at the bottom of the spring. (I spent about five years repairing the big copiers for IBM before they sold them all to Kodak lo those many years ago, and I got spoiled by IBM's wonderful exploded diagrams. You might have 400+ parts on one small page, but they all had little dotted lines and arrows showing what attached to what, as well as descriptive titles. Often overly descriptive, e.g. "inner upper left lever latch support arm set screw").

What would you suggest I try? (I'm guessing that singing to it is unlikely to work.)

Ron, have you tried soaking in a thin corrosion cracker oil while dipping a smaller container in the ultrasound? works like a charm for getting clean, fully functinoal fillers out of those rustballs you sometimes find on a vac.

Oh yeh, many times. I have some jars marked with one thing or another for soaking parts. One has to be very careful if the filler is in a pen, but out of the pen the filler can be soaked in a penetrating oil. Sometimes it takes a long time though......

Okay, this sounds good, but I've not a clue as to "cracker oil"! Gather up lots of crackers and put them in a press to squish all the oil out? And any difference here between a glass jar and plastic? I would guess that the plastic would, being softer, reduce the effect, but that's just a wild guess.

And from Ron's subsequent post, I'm now confused as to whether you mean just the entire filler unit should be immersed in oil in a jar in the ultrasound, or filler unit while still in pen barrel.

I'm still at step one of trying to figure out how to safely get the lockdown unlocked and raised so that I can then get the filler unit out!

And thank you all for your help! Frustrating though these can at times be, I really am enjoying learning how to fix them. I mostly teach philosophy, which is great, but I really miss getting my paws dirty, working with tools, etc. (Shedding a few tears for the table saw, band saw, drill press, etc. that I had to leave in San Francisco).

Gretchen

Any oil that's thin and has corrosion cracker additives. If you're willing to buy online try my source: ferree's tools from battle creek michigan. They sell one of the best corrosion crackers I've ever used (I'm in the wind instrument repair business)

Of course we mean filler OFF the pen, filler on the pen requires mild liquids or any potentially harsh solvent can kill your barrel.

Just looked through Ferree's tools -- Ooooooooohhhhhhhh! Major tool lust!!! And one of my students (a trombone player of course) works at Shires making trombones, and directed me to the wonderful youtube video showing the making of a trombone there. "How its made - trombones" How its made - trombones" Yes, okay, I'm in way off topic land, but anyone who is interested in making or repairing pens would probably find this very wonderful indeed!

Is "cracker" here just Ferree's name for anti-corrosion additives? The term "cracker oil" does appear in oil industry info sites, but seems unrelated. And I gather from what Ron was saying that the idea is to keep a jar of this and simply submerge metal parts in it, then fish them out and keep the oil? And I gather that this is fine for metal pen innards, whether aluminum, brass, or steel? (I don't know what all else is in the parts -- nickel maybe?). Would it, for instance, be helpful for corrosion on pressure bars? Hmm, what do you then clean it with to avoid harming the pen body??


AND, a drop of olive oil (I checked, and it's actually used in some lubricants intended to improve the surface quality of aluminum, and surely the pen can survive a tiny bit of olive oil), and a hairdryer have gotten the lockdown tube about half way up. It does feel unpleasantly gritty and tight, so I'm going very slowly. Does it make sense to keep gently but persistently pulling up the lockdown unit this way?

Now to order a large vac wrench! (Hope I'm not being too optimistic)

Gretchen

I use J88 Corrosion Cracker from Ferree's. Good product, you can use it in the ultrasound (don't fill the entire tub with it, just use a plastic cup and sumberge the part and then dip the bottom of your plastinc cup nside the ultrasound tub)

Great tip guys, thanks!

Is this far enough to safely try to remove the filler? Olive oil and the hair dryer (and wiping off the black gunk after each depression) have gotten it to this point where it seems to have hit a hard stop. However, as you can see from the happy regular size lockdown next to it, it's not coming out as far.

And am I right that the potential problem is that the bottom end of the lockdown is attached to a petrified diaphragm? Hmm, in which case should I be going in though the barrel after making one of the sliding tube gizmos? (This is a striped section, but looks to be separate from the section.)

Click to view attachment

Gretchen