Well, I hate to rub it in after buying this pen out from under System of Adam, but I did not know he was looking at it so all is far in pens and war.


This is the copper Transitional I scooped up on e-bay for $20.00 (and a wopping $2.00 S/H) just turned out to be not only a Transitional, but there is not the "Esterbrook" name stamped on the clip! Oh... and the jewel has these three funny stripes cut into it too.

The nib is nice, but just a 2668 nib, smooth and clean. The body is in perfect shape and even took on ink! (I did replace the sac and polish the whole pen though)

Here is a photo:

Wow. Just stunning. The copper looks just amazing in the sunlight. Well done, you've made me quite jealous...

I particularly like the color and patterning, nice pen.

I bid on a "plain jane" gray J that just happened to have a 9128 nib in it.

(Funny, and I'm not even looking for THAT nib for me but for my best
friends Estie I hope to get him for Christmaramahannakwanza.)

Da*n bidding hit near $30 (stupit pen even had initials carved in it) and I bailed...

Bruce in Ocala, FL

Nice score. I think the ribbed jewel is customary for the transitional J. But the clip not having "ESTERBROOK" imprinted is interesting. I wonder what that's about. It gives the pen a cleaner look, IMHO. Good find!

Nope, there were four minor changes in the Transitionals. The first ones had "R. Esterbrook & Co." on the body, the three rib jewel and no name on the clip. The second version dropped the "& Co." from the body can kept the clip and jewel (like mine) Then they dropped the three ribbed jewel for the thrid change and on the last change they added the name to the clip. All my other ones have the name on the clip and a round jewel. (I have three other Transitionals in red, green, and blue, plus todays copper. Then I have a black and a silver (gray?) in the mail. I will be missing just the gray one as I think the silver one is what is in the mail to me now.

My sights are set on one of the old Bell System pens next..

Very, very sweet!!! And you would never have guessed that the pen looked that good in the ebay listing! My hearty congrats on this one. I just got done restoring a very nice Bell Systems LJ pen for myself, I'd be up for a trade if you have any esties your getting rid of...

Adam

Very nice!
What did you use to restore that beautiful showroom shine?

I use buffing wheels at 620 rpm on my buffer. I use a dremmel and lots of caution to polish the top of the nibs. For the body I will mask the impring and threads to buff with a mild compound and remove the tape over the imprint when I switch to a fine polish. The fine polish really brings out the stainless steel hardware on the pens. Some damage can be sanded out like deep scratches and some cap "banding" but on the Esties teeth marks are the worst. They need to be heated out and I have not been able to get them out without some warpage to the plastic. I hear it can be done, but they are better skilled than I am.

That said, I would not recomend trying this method if you are not "good" with a buffer as it takes just a second or poor approach angle to rip the clip or lever off the pen.

Thanks for the comments though, The ability to really agressively polish these Esties is what I am drawn to in the first place.

Man, I wish I could figure out that polishing stuff. Is there anything that can be done if you don't have a Dremmel tool or a buffer? What about a good ol' fashioned leather rag and some plastic polish? I have some pens that need polish...but I am low on funds

You could get good results by hand, many swear by only hand polish. In fact with some pens I agree! I would never take for example, my gold filled Parker-51 cap to the buffer. I would never dremmel polish a two tone masked nib on a Sheaffer. (Ok, just that once dangit!)

Low end, I could power polish with a hand drill clamped to a table and some 4" buffing wheels from Home Depot if I had to. A lot would depend on the speed of the drill and how good you are when it comes to buffing. A dremmel tool will kill the plastic body though, I only use that for nibs and at the very lowest speed. Even then, you have to make sure you are not buffing where you could ever hit the nib wrong or it is ruined. The good thing, is that nibs can be replaced and the pens are cheap. I have a small box of spare parts and a tackle box of "almost pens". These slots have pens that may be missing a clip, section ect... I have a metal lathe to make new jewels so that is not a problem and I can swap clips from any pen while re-using the original rivets too.

In all, the Esties are fun pens to play with, cheap to buy, and good writing pens in all. Combined with a good supply of inexpensive NOS nibs to choose from, makes it almost the perfect vintage pen to play with.

BTW, I just found and bought the last color to give myself a "set" of Estie Transitionals!

A tube of Simichrome, a jewlers cloth, some soft flannel cloth and elbow grease do wonders.

Wipe the pen down first with the jewelers cloth, then take a very small amount on the flannel (or atleast some soft material) and rub it in. Use another cloth to wipe it off and viola, a nice shiny pen. If you want to go futher get some wax( carnuba, museam wax) and buff it some more. As for the nib, I only use the jewelers cloth. These are my habits anyway.

OhYea - nice score there Firefyter!!

Thanks! Looks like I need to get me some of that Simichrome.

Awesome! Thanks. I will definitely go looking for Semichrome

Beautiful pen! I lucked out too and got a green transitional exactly like your copper one. It needed a new sac and J-Bar but I paid next to nothing for it (I'm not sure why it slid through the cracks but I got it for under seven bucks). The only problem I have with the pen is that the ribs on the jewel are rotated about thirty degrees away from the clip. I haven't wanted to risk putting any pressure on it to see if I can get it to turn. Does anyone know how these are attached and if it is safe to try and twist them?

It makes a great hood ornament there on your car too!
pb2

The jewel has splines that fit into grooves in the plate on the clip. Turn the entire clip and jewel to loosen the jewel. One word of caution though, the main reason that a jewel is rotated is because the "nut" actually a black plastic circle in the cap is loose from the inside of the cap. If you pinch the top of the cap a little bit you can hold it still while you unthread the jewel...

Adam

I might disagree with you a bit Adam. That copper pen in this post also had the jewel rotated off a bit. The jewel can lock into the clip in a few places and can be loosened using the clip as a "wrench" Try to gently unscrew the clip, the jewel should NOT move seperate of the clip. If the clip moved and not the jewel, then the clip has stripped the jewel. If the clip spins and does not loosen, then the inner "nut" is spinning. If you get the clip to unscrew, you can position the jewel in line with the clip and screw the clip back on. (I would polish the pen with it off) You can also rotate the jewel 180 degrees so that the clip is lined up between the breather holes where (I think) the clip was factory set.

I agree with everything you just said and everything I said earlier, this might explain my bosses insistence that I work on my communication skills... to clarify, after loosening the jewel and clip you can reposition the jewel in the clip in the correct orientation then rescrew the whole thing back together. If the inner "nut" part is spinning a drop of super glue between the inner cap wall and the "nut" will make sure that you don't have this issue again.

Does this make sense or do I need to go back on my medications...

Thanks guys! Worked like a charm. Can sleep at night now knowing the jewel in my green estie is aligned.