Hello,

I got a nice Waterman Prèface in ebay. It looks new and writes wonderfully with its gold F nib, but I have a problem, sometimes, when I uncap the pen, I find ink on the section (not much, just a few droplets). I must wipe it off with a piece of paper or something to avoid ink on my fingers.

Could it be related with how firm the pen caps? I need some force to uncap it, more than my other pens, not much but enough to be noticed.

Also, I have noticed that the nib is slightly out of the centerline of the plastic piece that supports it, just very slightly, Could this be part of the problem?

I am using Waterman inks so the pen should be designed to deal with it w/o problems.

BTW, Is it possible to unscrew the nib in this pen?

( I will put a copy of this post i the Waterman forum, just in case).

Put this reply on your other post too!!

First of all, I am no expert. So take my advice with caution!

However, I bought one of these Preface Waterman pens new, about two years ago. Lovely looking and writes very smoothly - it is a medium nib.

The downside is that it has always skipped. I found that a tint tiny drop of washing up liquid in the converter or in the cartridge, helped, and also a certain very free flowing ink worked well. (MY own mixture, don't ask what it contains!!)

But the trouble is that it did then, with this ink, sometimes let a couple of droplets of ink spray out on uncapping. (Click fit)

Yesterday I did something drastic. I twisted the nib gently and it came out of the section with feed - so I re-aligned the nib against the feed and put it back. I was consulting Da Book** at the time - about nib alignment. It seems to have worked, and now I hope to use a normal ink with normal flow and everything will be OK.

I've been a bit scared to mess with pens - but now I feel I might not worry too much about taking them apart and fixing such problems. They say if you are inexperienced, do it on a cheap pen first, but I did not have a choice!

** The Complete Guide to Repair and Restoration by Frank Dubiel (Known as Da Book)