Ok - I got today my first vintage pen. It's a vacumatic 'fully serviced' - but there are some unusual things going on with it.

It is very gushy - unusually wet.
It needed filling 3 times for one letter (yes I write long letters but not THAT long!)..... Am I filling it incorrectly??

The other odd thing is that the nib, although smooth, caused the pen to roll and my writing to slope backwards. It doesnt appear to be a left oblique.....
Was the last owner perhaps a lefty that has worn the nib or some kind of paranormal channelling experience?

I want to love this pen and we are friends - but I just don't know how long it will last...

Congrats on the new pen. I got my first vacumatic yesterday, stuck it in some ink and pushed the plunger down. I ran it dry today while taking notes in court. Feeling I had done something wrong I looked up how to fill it and found that the plunger needs to be depressed aproxx 10 times allowing the pen to fill to capacity. Looking at it with back light it would seem that I have managed to get a fairly large amout of ink into it this time. Give that a try or wait for someone with more experience to chime in.

Regards,
NB

Perhaps its not as fully serviced as you were led to believe. Could be the diaphragm is not properly seated. An easy way to test is to take off the blind cap and try to blow through the filler. If ink leaks out, you have a diaphragm that isnt completely sealing.

how do I do that exactly?

ah yes thanks - I was doing a few times but not enough it seems

I also have a Vacumatic which seems to hold only a small amount of ink. When I bought it (from a member here) I was informed it had had a new sac 6 months earlier. And I have tried long and hard to get more ink into it. There is no evidence of leakage anywhere. It too writes pretty wet, but that was why I bought it...... It's actually for sale on Flebay now as although I like the nib and the way it writes, the pen itself is just too small for my hand.

Glad that helped. I have been having a great time with mine thus far it is a super pen.

Take the blind cap off, put the end of the pen in your mouth. Seal around the pen with your lips and blow. When the world goes red with speckles and you feel faint, you're blowing too hard.
If the nib drips, and keeps dripping as long as you blow, then you have a leak. If there is a drip or two, and no more, then the sac just inflated a little to cause the drip, but there is no leak.

Doesn't sound hygenic but it's a super quick way of finding out of the sac's got a leak.

Regards

Richard.

That's really helpful, I shall try it!

Two most common reason for a vac not filling properly
is a busted sac and a missing breather tube. As everyone
here suggested, first check if the sac is intact, then
check if the breather tube is present. For this, unscrew the
section (at the middle of the pen) and look for an 2-3 cm long
thin plastic tube behind the feed. If the pen is transparent,
then you can check it before light.If it is not present, you
will need some repair....

I don't understand your problem with the nib. A few photos will
help.

And as far as I know, descriptions for vintage pens may sometime
be... deceptive at the best.....

Thank you - after I had come back around from my brief spell of dizziness I can say - no leak.

On further inspection of the nib - hahaha it is in fact a left oblique! How ever this does not explain its gushiness. What I did also see was that the nib appears quite loose and wanders around the feed after a few paragarphs - I will take a photo to show.

this is what happens after writing:

The tines don't seem to be aligned and I don't think the pen's nib is an original left oblique but rather a normal nib modified into a left oblique but the modification hasn't been by a professional nib meister. For filling a vac, you need to press on the plunger till the end , eight times or ten times, if you need to fill the pen to often, either the mechanism has a problem or the pen wasn't serviced. Check Richard Binder or John Mottishaw for a correct nib readjustment, ink flow and for vacumatic filler restoration there is Ron Zorn.

I am curious what makes you say this.... I have seen a few original obliques and this one looks no different.... of course the picture is not great...

Any iridium tipping left?

d

It sounds like the nib, feed or both are not correctly seated, this will cause the problem you are having and most likely the gushyness of the nib...
If you do not know how to do this, I would recommend sending the pen to someone who does....