Hey Fellows.

First of all I'd like to thank all the people that responded my request for a music nib. I had a lot of responses! Some people offered me really bargains, some people offered me help, and I ended up taking 2 "freebies". I received one of them today.

Upon inspection, I "combed" the tines and replated the steel nib. I fitted it on a Pelikan feed/collar and installed it on one of my vintage pels.

Pictures:


overall view of both pens, my everyday 100N and the pen that received the music nib


closeup of them nibs


closeup on the music nib. See something funny?


closeup of my heavenly smooth ultra nice to write with 14K M vintage pel nib


comparing sizes of both pelikans posted... god, I really love my 100N... so nice to carry around n my shirt pocket, so nice to write with when posted...


different applications, angles of attack and rotation


just wasting a little paper...

OK, I get now why italic/stub lovers are getting used to music nibs. They do put on a nice wet line, but having better air/ink control, they don't bleed thru or blot or feather. They're more like a paintbrush. I don't get how you get used to write with the music nib in a "normal" position, though. Most of the music writing is done at high attack angles and 90deg rotation. the other 20% is for nuances, chords, etc.

If you're looking for a pen for actually writing music, I would be hesitant in recommending a gold nib. Wait, if you're getting a music nib just for giggles I also wouldn't recommend gold as first tryout. I have had 2 great music nibs in the past (one vintage Waterman and one vintage sort of "feathertocuh" sheaffer open nib snorkel pen) both of them were 14K... I'm not only not sure they performed any better than this steel nib, but actually having second thoughts about that. I can't compare right now as one of them music pens I gave it to a student of mine and the other somebody stole it from my desk! (one of the reasons I gave up teaching... )

Thanks again and I hope somebody can use this information.

We have an amazing review here!. And original, not so many about music nibs made... They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and is true. What nice shots you've taken!. They show not only the pens and the nibs but the actual written samples as they were in front of my own desk. Congratulations, sincerely. Very nice ones.
Now, you'll have to tell us more about what "replated the nib" actually means because I'm awed. You do replating? How?

One more thing... Hilary is one of the nicest, genuinely wonderful members of this forum. She bought a pen from me recently and it was a privilege to deal with her all way through. You're a lucky guy you've met her. She is not only generous, but a true lady.

As another music nib lover, I would like to point out that there is no limit beyond the width of a pen's inner cap as to how wide a music nib can be....and the number of tines a music nib has is limited only by the laws of physics (and the durability of the gold alloy being used). Music nibs provide added ink flow to the extra wide nibs used for artistic purposes and highlighting, as well as added flex for additional flow regulation (even for a Parker 51, as shown on the site link below).

They are not as common as I would like them to be... It took years and a great deal of searching just to form a basic vintage music nib collection - with many models having never been produced with this nib design option. Thus - I've made them for the past 10 years or so. "If you can't find them, and really truly want them....make them..." ;-)

Thank you for the images - they are gorgeous....particularly of this most favored of designs!

Thanks!

Ondina: Hilary is a Lady in all deepness of the word indeed. Replating is, well, putting a new layer of gold over the fainted (some times completely removed) old one. I still use acid gold solutions opposed to modern tendencies of using cyanides wich are dilluted in basic (alchaline) solutions. It's every bit as poisonous any way and I get to produce historically correct, really durable plating. I do sterling silver, nickel silver (20% nickel 80% silver, it's really a "hard" silver) white, rose, green and yellow gold in all kinds of "titling" (12, 14, 18, 24K) and recently I discovered how to plate gold with a slight hint of blue... due to a chemist's mistake! In this case means that I dismantled the nib (Hilary sent the nib fitted in an estie) I buffed it, burnished it, worked the slits and dipped in a 24k gold solution. I left it there so it would have 20 microns (wich is more than enough for a steel nib) and then assembled and hand smoothened.

3 tines nibs are better for the penner wanting wider / juicier lines because they tend to "lay the line" OVER the paper instead of poodling a lot of ink over that width like a regular nib does when it's juicy. I do like my nibs on the wet side, say, 7 in a 1 to 10 scale, but an italic with a HEAVY flow will feather or bleed thru on certain papers.

Eternally Noodling: serious props man! you do an amazing work there. That's far beyond retipping. I take you use a micro torch like "the little torch" and rolled gold sheet before tipping, am I right? not trying to get over "propietary processes" but just ballparking out of true curiosity. I have done certain experiments but I don't like the platinum wire I use for tipping. (ok, I should say I prefer the electrofused tipping process, I believe it to produce more consistent weld -not if you have a good eye and hand with your torch, but!

I can only imagine (and drool over the KB) one of your pelikan nibs over a custom crafted HR feed, with 4 ink and 2 air capillars....

Extreme nib lust!!!

Everything has been used that I can think of...even vintage gasoline torches courtesy silver workers of the Navajo. Those are operated with a hand pump to pressurize gasoline in a brass chamber...then blasted out until it heats up to a nice blue flame.

The cost per NOS nib is about 1/2 what a gold nib costs in India (and those are hand made!), and the cost per platinum group retip is the lowest in the world. That's not because I'm completely nuts...merely still living in 1998 (sometimes 1991 ;-). I also can't stand seeing so many good pens scraped for want of a tip because tips are now so out of reach to so many. To beat the cost in India while in Massachusetts simply means the price is in a time warp.

The VERY high/extreme temperatures are not needed for gold or silver....but rather for the platinum group. Palladium...and particularly iridium/osmium and ruthenium require such high temperatures that they melt porcelain crucibles and one can't use normal welder's work areas. To drill a ruthenium or osmium stylo nib requires either massive energy and cost in diamond drill bits of incredibly small diameter (the hardest metals known to man require diamonds to drill through)...OR...massive temperatures and extremely odd techniques. To retip a Parker T-1 requires the complete absence of oxygen and a laser. It never is profitable once one is beyond the conventional. To make a toggle harpoon tip (the only conventional fountain pen tip with multiple writing surfaces that moves/pivots akin to a 19th century toggle harpoon) makes one sweat bullets because a single mistake renders the platinum group metals mere scrap. Even a sculpted ruthenium harpoon tip - or delicate "T" 3 tined overlay nib is an "all or nothing" piece of work. Inlaid nibs require very close proximity of a solid block of ice in to extremely high temperatures (a molten ball that flashes a weld in seconds to the tip - cooling so quickly as to not damage the plastic inlay that is imbedded in the solid ice block behind the heat shield). If the high temperature area is exposed to the ice on the other side directly, it results in an explosion. Cuts are at 1/9,000th an inch and about 42,000 rpms...and if cutting material snaps...it can cut exposed skin far worse than any razor blade (I know this personally) and remove a finger tip in the blink of an eye before the blood even knows to bleed.

It is the violent and dangerous side of fountain pens. ;-)

Wow impressive review!

Thank you very much those scans and informations are very interesting!