Pilot Custom Heritage 92

June 22, 2016

I bought a Pilot Custom Heritage 92 at some point in the past, and I believe that it is a well made pen with much promise of being a great writer. However, as much as I have tried, I just can not come "love the pen," and I paid too much for it to just throw it away or to just leave it unused on my desk. My penmanship is never really very good, but with this pen, it is worse, no matter how I try! The nib is a medium, and I have been told that a medium in Japan is more like a fine in other parts of the world. So, I am seriously thinking about have the nib "worked" or just having it replaced. I want the line to be just a tiny bit wider and the flow a little more generous.

What do you suggest? Who are the "repair" folks you would recommend to make this nib more to my liking? Would you just have the nib replaced with a broad? Is replacing the nib on a Pilot pen a "big undertaking?"

Your thoughts, please.

June 22, 2016

I think it is a number 5 nib which are also on custom 74 and 91. So if you have one of those pens already you could try changing nibs.

June 22, 2016

Pilot nibs are friction-fit, so you could just pull the nib out and replace it with a new one. It's rather difficult to find loose Pilot nibs for salw--you might need to look for a trade. The Custom 74 nib will fit, but the nib is not rhodium-plated, so it wouldn't match the gold colour of the 74 nib--if that matters to you. Now, the Custom 91 Heritage also has a rhodium-plated #5 nib, and that would work. Regardless, it sounds like what you really need is a Pilot broad nib. A little bit of tweaking might increase the flow, but making the line wider is going to require a broader nib.

June 23, 2016

If you like softer nibs, buy a custom 91 with a soft medium nibs and swap the nibs and sell the other pen. You will be out of pocket a few tens of dollars but will have a nice pen with a unique (among modern pens) nib which flows wetter than writes wider than the medium.