I'm repairing a Parkston for a friend. It needs a new sac (got the old one out), but the J-Bar was also broken (due to corrosion). To install the J-Bar, one just slides it in with the long part parallel to the lever, right?

I've started to notice that the lever is very loose. It has some wiggle room and it only attached by a very thin fulcrum to the barrel. Is there anyway to reinforce it? Will this go away once I have installed the new J-Bar? I'm worried that normal operation will cause the fulcrum to break.

Here's a picture of it:

Click to view attachment

Hi Dermann,

I had this problem once. Fixing a lever-filler pen - pffft! Broken pressure bar!

Yes, without a pressure-bar, the lever will be very loose and flappy. You need the pressure-bar there to keep the lever nice and stiff. Find a dead pen (one which is beyond repair) and salvage it's pressure-bar. Bend accordingly to fit into your pen and shove it into the barrel in-line with the lever (use some tweezers for this). Once it's in, test the lever. It should be held rigid and flush against the barrel by the force of the pressure-bar pressing against it. Bend the lever. It should be stiff and firm.

I hope this helped somehow.

By the way - what kind of pen is that?

Thanks that is really helpful.

It's a Parkston. Beyond that I haven't a clue. From what I've read on these boards, Parkston is a sub-brand of Eclipse, and it's basically of "third-tier" quality. It's absolutely enormous, too. It takes a size 22 or 23 sac! Fits great in my hand and has a generally beefy look to it that I like.

The nib is marked (in large letters) 14 KT GOLD then right before the nib goes into the section it says Plated. It doesn't seem to be iridium tipped. Writes well enough.

He only paid $5 for it at a flea market, I'd say it was well worth it.

My suggestion is, go to a flea-market and poke around and find a pen that is absolutely worthless - ie - it's not worth repairing. Buy it for a song and take it home. Depending on how bad the pen is, open it up (or just smash it open) and get out the pressure bar (this pen needs to be a lever-filler, obviously). If the bar on this pen is of a decent size and is nice and bendy (but not rusted), then you should be able to use this pressure bar to fix your other pen. Most bars are interchangable.

Adjust the bend in the 'hook' of this fresh J-shaped pressure bar so that the bar fits snugly into the barrel of your pen. Then, line up the bar with your lever. If it's done right, the lever should be held in place by the pressure-bar and the bar should be held inside the barrel by the friction between the J and the barrel. It takes a bit of testing and trial-and-error to get this right, but it should work.

Oh, I already purchased a replacement J-Bar, I just have to wait for it to come in.

Thanks for the installation instructions, though. Those'll come in handy when I get it.

Ah well, whatever works for you. I just find buying junkers and stripping them for parts to be easier. Best of luck with reinstalling a new J-bar!

When I buy on the internet, it's all there for me and I don't have to leave the house (using petrol). Plus I always feel bad when I have to canabalise something, even if it can never be used again.