Vintage Pelikan 400, M Nib

[Nimerino]

Hello friends,

 

Having lurked on the forums for some time and having benefited greatly from the combined wisdom and the experiences here, I’ve been slowly building up a small collection of pens. Given that I found reviews on the forum to be the single most valuable asset when choosing which pens to buy, I want to do my part.

 

Please forgive the pre-amble. I am aiming for my reviews to be reasonably to the point. I will be scoring each category individually, but the combined score will not be a (weighted) average, but rather a representation of my opinion of what the pen achieves as related to price and design, in combination with the subjective aspect of desirability. I apologise for the terrible pictures, I will soon amend the post to rectify this.

 

Today I will be covering the 1950’s Pelikan 400, produced, by all accounts, between 1950 and 1955. It was then superceded by the 400N, produced for only one year, before itself being replaced by the significantly more common 400NN. The 400 was the top-of-the-line Pelikan of the post-war era, though more upscale variants of the pen (numbered 500-700) were also produced in more luxurious materials. The pen differs from the 120 and 140 pens (low- and mid-range respectively) in design and in nib softness, the 140 having a harder 14K nib than the 400, but a softer one than the steel-nibbed 120 school pen.

 

Packaging and appearance: 9/10

I purchased the pen from eBay, having searched for a 400 (as opposed to a 400N or NN) in good/-to-great condition with a box (it mattes to some people…). What I received was an item that, frankly, appears unused. The initial impression on seeing the box is wonderment at how tiny it is. When juxtaposed with the box from a modern M1005, it appears comically undersized, barely large enough to hold the pen diagonally within. On top, there is a drawing of the pen in the classic green striations, and inside, under the pen, there is the instruction manual, which I have yet to look at. For myself, there is a sort of romantic evocation to the design of the box, harking back to a time when these were not necessarily luxury items.

 

The 400 was produced in a large number of aesthetic variants, of which I will say very little, other than to direct you here. My particular pen has the classic Pelikan striations, but these are black against a light green translucent barrel, as opposed to the classic green stripes. On these older pens, the stripes are often appealingly irregular and almost organic, as opposed to the uniform, light green stripes of later pens. However, this obviously does not come across as clearly on my pen, which instead counters with restrained stealth, while retaining some visual interest. The piston can be seen moving inside the pen when the piston knob is turned, and the ink level is clearly visible against a light source. The barrel and binde of earlier Pelikan 100 and 101s are, from what I understand, manufactured from celluloid rather than resin. I am not certain whether this is the case with the 400, but I will say that the binde has a slickness and heft to it, unfamiliar from the modern pens, which gives a beautiful feel in the hand. The feed appears to be made from ebonite, and its capillary channels are cut length-wise along the axis of the pen. The clip curves outwards in the classic Pelikan beak shape, emerging from a gilded cap ring surrounding the cap top. The finial is black, with an engraved Pelikan logo filled in green. The section is black acryclic/celluloid, with threading at its proximal point, requiring almost exactly 1 turn to remove the cap.

 

The nib itself (friction fit in the earliest pens and screw fit from August 1950 onwards) is quite simple, without a size marking. It was sold to me as a medium, but the box leads me to believe it is a left-footed oblique medium. It is marked “Pelikan”, “585” and “14 karat”. I have not disassembled the pen, and am therefore unsure whether I have the friction fit or, as is more likely, the screw fit nib.

 

It is difficult, with the above, to convey just how special this pen feels when looking at it. I would go so far as to say that it is a more interesting design than the current pens, and it is not at all surprising that it was the archetype for the resurrected Souverän line decades later, rather than the more rounded 400NN, which was sold for almost twice as long.

 

 

Handling: 8/10

The first impression upon receiving the pen is of how small it is. With the popularity of the larger Souverän pens it is easy to forget that Pelikan shied away from making large pens until the late 1980s, when the M800 was originally released. Despite being a card-carrying member of the large pen fan club, and someone who does not post pens, I must admit that the 400 feels pretty much perfect in the hand. I do not post my pens, but having done so for this review, I found it to be well-balanced both posted and unposted. When writing, the pen belies its small size and feels entirely natural in my size 9 hand, something I had not expected when I first saw it. But there is no denying that a slightly larger pen would not be unwelcome.

 

 

Filling system: 10/10

A piston filler, and a good one. I have not measured its actual ink capacity, but like all Pelikan differential fillers I assume it is affected by the positioning of the piston shaft when assembling. I have been writing pretty heavily with the pen, and have yet to refill it since receiving it over a week ago. And despite being nearly 70 years old, the piston is still smooth, with very little play in the mechanism. It feels churlish to compare this to more exotic filling mechansisms, but obviously, the pen would be more interesting with a crazy filling system a la Visconti. More interesting, perhaps, but not necessarily better.

 

Nib: 10/10

The nib… As my first vintage pen, it has been an enlightening experience to actually use a properly flexy nib. As the vintage Pelikans come in a huge variety of nib grades, some of which were less flexible by design (and some of which were designed to be wholly inflexible), my experience should not be generalised. ‘My’ nib is a M/OM (not entirely sure which) that is the single most expressive, bouncy, characterful nib I have ever used. It must, however, be pointed out that I do not believe this to be a ‘flex’ nib as such; this is partly due to the nature of the nib itself, and secondly my own preference for medium nibs, that limits the available line variation, and the nib doesn’t feel as if it’s going to spring under even a heavy hand. It just feels like a wonderful compromise. After a couple of pages of writing, it had seemingly improved my handwriting. I am by no means a small man, but my profession requires a light hand, and this carries over to my writing. I had to adjust to writing slightly harder on downstrokes, and given the peculiarities of how I hold the pen and angle the paper, this translates into heavier cross-strokes in my letters. But it’s the feel of the nib as you write. It fairly bounces along the paper, leaving thick lines of ink and then gliding effortlessly to produce beautiful loops when needed. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever used before, which makes complete objectivity difficult here; my limited experience renders comment on how it compares to other flexible nibs impossible. I have had the occasional hard start, which I ascribe to the feed rather than the nib. Priming the feed solves this problem for the whole writing session. Most interestingly, it is obvious where the current Pelikan range get their general approach to writing feel; my M805 and my two M1005s clearly share a genealogy with this pen.

 

 

In summary: 9/10

 

This is a lovely pen. I’ve only had it for a short while and it has already wormed its way into my affections. There is something quite special about these, hiding under the mass-produced commodity of the era in which they were made. There is a sense of craftsmanship and a care in the design and execution of this pen that marks it out, and a straight line of derivation can be drawn from this to today’s Souverän pens. My personal ideal pen would have this exact nib, be larger (at least the size of an M800) and a feed that was less finicky at start-up. But until then, this latest addition is one of my favourite pens.

[OCArt]

Wow, it does look like a new pen. I have a 400 on order from Rick Propas to match, as close as possible, my birth year of 1951. I already have a vintage 140 that has that wonderful nib you describe. Very nice find and a nice review. (P.S. my 140 has no start-up issues, maybe you need a tune-up.)

[Nimerino]

Thank you. Actually the startup issues resolved themselves after about a week of writing. I have yet to try a 140, but I seem to remember reading Rick Propas commenting somewhere that it has a slightly different nib to the 400. It would be interesting to know if this is the case as, having been bitten by the vintage Pelikan bug, a 140 and a 400NN are next on my wish list.