Hi, this is my first post here at fountain pen network. I just got into fountain pens last week when I bought a Lamy Safari and before it even arrived I couldn't resist bidding on two vintage parker 51s to start off a small collection of pens for daily use.

After doing a little research it turned out that these were vaccumatic 51s so I was pretty much counting on needing to have them restored. When they arrived yesterday I noticed that they were full of dried up ink, the pump was also stuck so I decided to soak and rinse them out with running water just to see if I could get them going a little.. I was able to make them write pretty well just after a little soaking, after some more soaking the pump started to function, it took a long time to flush the 51s out nearly completely of the dried up ink. Once I was pretty satisfied that I had gotten the 51s as clean as I could without taking them apart I decided to try to fill them up with some Noodler's ink to test them out, they both took up some ink easily but I didn't get a lot of bubbles on the downstroke, only the first couple presses. Both write well and I filled over a page with each, no flooding or leaking issues yet.

Today I decided to repaint the blue diamond in the one that was missing half (it was only missing 1/4 until last night when I was polishing the cap with a cloth)
So I went in search of Testors 1110 blue and found it at the first place I looked locally, a "Michaels" craft store, they also had the 1111. I proceeded to scrape away the remaining blue diamond with a thumb tack and magnifying glass, then applied the new paint with the same tack.. IMHO it came out pretty well for a first try, if I didn't know I had redone it I would have no idea, even by looking at it closely with the magnifying glass.

Now on to my first serious misstep, or so I thought.. while I was at Michaels I had a look around for anything else I might find useful to clean up my 51s, I came across some Mona Lisa "Super Film" Micron Abrasive Film and bought it, after painting the cap I took out a sheet, got it a little wet and starting running it across the body of my blue 51 thinking I was going to end up with a "Glass-Like" finish as claimed on the package.. OMG! NOOOOOOOOO! it came out super scratchy and dull! I thought I had ruined my pen and was pretty bummed, at least until I could seek professional help. I had a quick look in some of the polishing threads but it didn't seem like I would be able to find any of the polishing products locally so I stopped by an Autozone to see if they would have anything and ended up buying some Meguiar's PlastX and a microfiber cloth, the PlastX says its made for clear plastic headlights. I took it home and applied a little to my messed up 51 to see if it would melt, it didnt't! So I globbed a bit on the rag and started polishing away, with a bit of elbow grease it started working really well, at that point I went back and roughed up the pen a bit more evenly with the Micron paper then continued the polish the pen with PlastX and a lot of elbow grease until it finished with a nice squeak.. all I have to say is WOW! it looks like a brand new pen, truly a mirror like finish!

I was really surprised how well the PlastX worked with a little effort, I went on and polished the other pen while skipping the micron paper.. it also turned out good as new except a few deeper nicks at the end.

Now on to my final experience and actual qustion.. when I received the 51s yesterday one had a steel cap with an gold plated clip and the other had a steel cap with a dark grey clip. After polishing the pens I decided to buff the jewel at the top a little, as I was doing this on the pen with the grey clip I noticed quite a bit of blackness ending up on my rag so I inspected the cap.. there is a gold-like substance hiding underneath all the greyness of the clip! I went on to polish the whole clip revealing a lighter gold colored clip compared to my other pen. could it be a brass clip? I didn't think gold could oxidise like this.

whew, sorry this ended up so long.. it would be better with pics but I don't have access to a camera at the moment. Im still open to sending the 51s in for restoration if the diaphram gives me trouble but so far they seem to be ok. Any thoughts or feedback would be very welcome!

edit: just opened one of the pens and noticed some ink around the plunger, the other is clean, I guess this confirms a busted diaphragm correct?

Yeah, its a gold clip. Use a gentle polish on it and try not to polish the cap-it should have some frosting on it still. Yeah, you need a new diaphragm, prolly in both pens, actually. But you can send in the leaking one then send in the one that is presently working. The working one will likely fail in the near future.

You most likely have pens from the World War II era, during which Parker often used silver as a base metal for gold-filled clips, since silver was not a "strategic" metal for the war effort. Under certain conditions, some silver atoms can "migrate" through the layer of gold and oxidize on the surface, which is what you buffed away (not sure what kind of cloth you're using but be sure not to buff the gold away!).



It seems as though one pen already needs to be restored and the other will probably need to be soon, so you might as well get it over with, but it's up to you. Personally, I wouldn't carry either of these pens loaded in my pocket until they are restored--you can't tell when they're going to make a mess.



Yes, assuming that ink didn't get on there some other way (e.g. inky fingers handling the plunger), and hopefully that's all it is, because the inks that people used in these pens early on was extremely corrosive.

Thanks for the informative replies Pete and Iridium! I'm just going to get it over with and send them both off to be restored.

if you need to check a diaphragm you can try'n blow thru the nib end. If you can get air pass the pen, diaphragm is busted. (make sure you don't blow thru a pen that's inked! )

great tip! thanks jicaino. I already had both pens clean, it turns out I have one with a busted diaphragm and the other is fine. I'll probably end up getting them both restored anyway to ensure not having to worry about it in the near future.