So is it okay to say, when in doubt, put it in a Parker 51?
I mean, if it can handle Superchrome, it can handle anything, right?

I love 51's!!! and although they are forgiving in terms of what you feed them....some inks are definitely better than others. As an example....and keep in mind this is a recent experiment with one 51 (fine & wet)....Visconti Blue (my favorite blue ink) ran like it was going through a sieve....on all my other pens....it was BAU...nice and properly restained. I have another 51 (fine & wet too) that when I fed it some Noodlers EL Lawrence...got terribly constipated.

In my opinion...Parker 51's can "take a licking, and keep on ticking"...but there are some limits.

It certainly does not hurt to push the envelope, if the color you prefer is on the fringes of behavior...go ahead and give it a try....

Regards,
Peter

No, I'd say a mid-century lever filler like a Sheaffer Lifetime or Esterbrook would be best. Fewer precision parts to gum up or rot away with weird ink combinations.

Not necessarily...

If a 51 is properly tuned it will handle most inks...
I have well tuned 51s that just won't write well with certain highly saturated inks and others that write with whatever I put in them ....
All pens seem to have a personal preference for certain inks....

I have to agree with Griz. Most of my "51's" have EF or F nibs, and they flow many inks very well. I hapen to love J. Herbin inks and use them in my vintage pens. However, many of the Herbin colors just do not flow from the "51's" well. It depends on the pen, "All pens seem to have a personal preference for certain inks ... " I think with any pen, try the ink you have in mind to see if that particular pen likes it.

My 51 behaves excellent with any ink I have ever tried. Noodler's BP Fox Red caused most of my other pens to skip, but the 51 seems to love it and anything else I put in it.

I have a med. nib Parker Vac and use that FPN Starry Night in it. (The ink matches the cedar blue nice) I have found it to work wonders with this pen.

I might tend more towards the Esties for abuse and ease of cleaning / problem repair. Plus, if you want an ink to flow better, you can just nib swap and be done with it!

Hmm, I just wanted something to run Noodlers in and it tends to be really runny/creepy

Well, at least nib creep won't worry you in a 51...

But Parker Penman Sapphire ink seems to just gum my 51 special up. But it's dedicated to Noodler's Bulletproof Black now, and will be for ever - and handles it brilliantly.

I have two "51"s that I use regularly and both have Noodler's in them. A black vac M has had Noodler's BP black in it almost constantly for the three-four years that I've owned it. I bought a plum one last October (also an M I believe) and have used Nooder's in it pretty consistently as well. I was changing colors with that one until FPN Tulipe Noire came out. Now that's what I use in it all the time. Perfect match. Both start right up even if it's been a day or two since I last wrote with them.

(Note that I have a couple more "51"s, but they are F or XF nibs and I don't use them much so no ink stories to tell.)

Superchrome contained quite a bit of isopropyl alcohol for fast drying, lethal to celluloid pens, and tended to become insoluble from the metallic dyes oxidizing if left in the pen for very long periods of time (this is why "51"s in the wild are sometimes clogged with flakes of insoluble stuff).

Modern inks, with the exception of iron gall inks (registrar's ink) will rarely react with any of the pen parts including steel nibs, although some are more likely to do so than others -- there are still a few low pH inks out there.

The only difficulty will be that any given pen may or may not work with any given ink, because all pens are slightly different from each other and all inks have slightly different viscosities and other flow characteristis.

A "51" in good shape is probably the most likely pen to handle just about any ink you want to use, but that is not to say that the one YOU have in YOUR hand at this particular moment will.

That said, the only pen I've had Noodler's El Lawrence work in with essentially no trouble other than being hard to start if not used for several days was a Parker 21 Super, very similar to a "51" internally, and El Lawrence is probably the most difficult ink I have in terms of clogging, refusal to flow, and general cussedness.

Fine and extra fine nibs will be a bit crankier than othes.


Peter