Cartridge converters

[vision35]

1. After filling the CC and writing a while, you notice the pen is getting a bit less smooth. Do you twist the converter knob a bit to get rid of the air or move more ink towards the nib? Is that the way converters are designed to work?

 

2. Does every CC work in this same way in filling: after you fill it, you need to push out three drops of ink and then rotate the CC knob back into the up position.

[Kees]

1. That often happens ... and of course, when it happens, you give the converter knob a twist: what else can you do? Similar problems occur with cartridges (which may need squeezing).

I hesitate to put the blame on the converter, though. In my experience, pens with a rubber-sack converter are less prone to running out of ink, but some of my pens have a piston converter and behave perfectly well...

 

2. This procedure is often recommended by FP makers. I never do it. Cleaning the nib with a tissue has the same effect, if you do it thoroughly.

[vision35]

1. That often happens ... and of course, when it happens, you give the converter knob a twist: what else can you do? Similar problems occur with cartridges (which may need squeezing).

So it's normal, but some times it happens and some times it doesn't and when the pen "runs dry" the first thing to try is twist the nob if there's ink in the CC, is what you're saying.

 

I was wondering if that makes the pen more likely to leak. It ties in with my second question. If you've twisted the cc nob to get more ink for the pen, have you broken some sort of vacuum that's keeping the pen in the cc, which somehow you'd created when you did the magical three drops out thing when you had first filled the pen.

[wimg]

Hi vision35,

 

No, I don´t consider it normal. This shouldn´t happen, not even with cartridges. What does happen is that the pen may dry out when not used for a longer period, in which case a little shake or a small turn of the knob may get the flow going again, but other than that, when you are writing, this shouldn´t happen unless you are running out of ink completely.

 

If this does happen, you are suffering from some sort of ink starvation, which may be caused by the feed or by the converter or cartridge. In case of the feed, if cleaning out the pen doesn´t fix it (flushing and rinsing), you will have to send the pen to a nibmeister, or back for warranty. In case of the converter, you may need to flush it with a soapy solution, and in case that doesn´t work, try a different converter, preferably of a different brand (provided it fits, of course). Some converters suffer from the Sticky Ink Disease or Syndrome (SID or SIS ), and some just will keep on suffering, even when flushed . If it is a cartridge, I wouldn´t know what to do, but I never had a cartridge with that problem.

 

Regarding filling a pen and putting 3 drops back into the bottle (or 2, or 4, depending on the recommendations of the different manufacturers ), this is really done for two reasons.

One is to make sure that the ink flow is more or less consistenly the same all the time, through the whole fill rather than a very wet writing experience in the beginnning, and a normal ink flow a bit later.

The second one is a bit more important, I would say, and that is indeed to prevent a small leak. Filling a pen through its feed means that the feed and area behind the nib get overflowingly full, and this is ink which is not controlled by the capillary flow through the feed. So, it is very well possible that this ink, which generally is about two drops, but obviously depends on the nib and feed size, just blobs onto the writing surface when writing. You don´t really want that...

 

Cleaning the nib with a tissue, as Kees indicates, is the same as wicking the nib after filling it, which should be done nib pointing upwards, and has the same effect as squeezing a few drops out by turning the piston down, and then up again.

 

HTH, warm regards, Wim