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How Big Off A Drop Will Break The Nib?


CatalinD

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Greetings! Shamefully I have to admit that I have managed to drop my pen nib first. The pen in question is a Parker Jotter Royal, not a verry expensive pen or something but for my country's standards it is still really overkill so I kinda' care about it. What has happened, was I that I found a random converter and I did a test fit as my Parker converter is inside my Parker 88. It all seemed to be fine (I even tried it over a pillow so it would fall on something soft if it does fall) but the second I tried to fill it with some ink I heared a pretty lovely sound... metal on glass. Yeah, the converter literally dropped my grip for me inside the ink bottle. It wasn't really a big drop, I woudn't say more than let's say 2 cm. but it still shocked me a bit and I tend to see expensive things as more fragile than they actually are so I decided to ask you guys if that thing might have damaged the nib as I currently see no real difference but I am a newbie in terms of fountain pens so who knows.

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Doubtful you have caused any harm. Look at the nib under a loupe and check that the tines are aligned.

https://youtu.be/1YRnN99412o?t=47

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Thanks for baisicly telling me what I knew but didn't fully accept. I will look at the tines in the morning but so far it seems to be fine as I have literally took the converter out of the 88 and just wrote an A4 size paper of "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" and the nib didn't scratch or stop writting at all.

PS: Also thank you for sening me to this video, I have subbed to the channel and look into it wen I get an ocasion to learn some more about the fountain pen.

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I dropped a Lamy 2000 6” onto a keyboard and severely misaligned/bent the nib. I then proceed to destroy the nib by trying to “fix” it. It does not take much to misalign a nib. In your case you’ll know when you go to write with it whether misalignment occurred.

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With Lamy/Cross send it back to the factory to be fixed for free.............other companies have warrantee work.

 

You need a loupe...(Everybody does! Good for nibs, hallmarks, stamps, coins and splinters.)...a $35 Belemo 10X good coated glass loupe is a once in a lifetime buy....you buy the same 10x power in a 40X cheap Chinese loupe...the batteries probably cost more than the loupe...so every few years you might need to buy a new one.

It's easy to bang a nib....slightly...............and easy to re-align. The first time is nervy, the third is Ho-Hum.

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Fortunately the nib seems to be fine, from that day until now it didn't give me signs of misalignment or bending.I might invest into that Belemo if I start to get more expensive pens. Thanks is for advice, and excuse me for forgetting about the thread and letting you offer responses without reading them.

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The answer to your question is, "It depends...." Height from which it was dropped (therefore acceleration due to gravity coming into play), angle of impact, nib material, thickness of the nib, weight of the pen, surface hit... all factor in.

 

A smallish steel nib like your's isn't likely to bend as you found out. A flexible gold Waterman #2 would I think, bend,or break. My son dropped an aluminum Pilot Vanishing Point nib down on the floor - and it landed in a crack, the shoulders caught by the sides of the somewhat wide crack, and sustained no damage. I on the other hand dozed off rating music for the radio station I worked for, and woke up as I felt my new Parker 75 slide out of my fingers nib down onto a concrete floor. That was the day I learned how to straighten a nib.

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depends on the surface it lands on

 

the office floor, carpeted, has caused a watch to break from a two foot drop

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Murphy's corollary for fountain pens:

 

A fountain pen dropped will always land on the nib...

PAKMAN

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more than about 6 or 8 inches and you can expect some damage. But a nib falling into the bottle is almost certainly not going to hurt it!

Selling a boatload of restored, fairly rare, vintage Japanese gold nib pens, click here to see (more added as I finish restoring them)

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I would also think that the construction of the pen would factor in. For example, dropping my solid brass Rotring 600 would probably result in more damage from the same height than something like a plastic Pro Gear Slim. Physics and all...

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a good topic for theoretic discussion...(?) :rolleyes:

 

for a moment I though calling for a group test among FPNers would provide useful answers...

but then again, no... probably we should remain in doubt :unsure:

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Also, Parker converters are non-standard and have a wider mouth than the International Standard. Only Parker and Aurora and some ST Dupont converters are likely to fit.

 

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I had a pen knocked off a desk a couple weeks back and I immediately assumed the nib was toast. Fortunately, it landed on the piston knob before bouncing to the nib. The nib was almost too wet before the accident and the little bend in the nib after falling from my desk actually made the nib a better writer. Sometimes luck works in your favor.

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