Problems With Noodler's Flex Fountain Pen

[ClassicHippie]

I received the Noodler's Flex Nib and Black Swan in Australian Roses today from Goulet Pens (fast shipping and great packing again, btw) and I'm having some issues. I loaded it up with the Australian Roses which was easy enough and my first experience with a piston filler. It started up right away and looked great- I did notice it needed much firmer pressure than usual to get anything thicker than a very fine line, but otherwise it wrote wonderfully.

I put the pen down for a couple hours and went back to it, but then it wouldn't start up. I tried Rhodia, Clairefontaine, and regular notebook paper. Finally it started, but now needs firm pressure to get it to write at all and has severe railroading problems. I have tried different angles, but nothing is working. Any advice?

[Pickwick]

One of the tips given on FPN is to flush the pen with a tiny drop of dish washing liquid in warm water, to get rid of the substances used in manufacture. Se if that works.

 

Kind regards,

 

Pickwick

[hawkgnat]

I don't have any of the Noodler's pens myself, but I seem to remember one of the criticisms of the initial release was that they tended to dry out really quickly. It sounds like that might be the problem once again, although I would have hoped they would have fixed such problems by now.

[physicsgirl]

One of the tips given on FPN is to flush the pen with a tiny drop of dish washing liquid in warm water, to get rid of the substances used in manufacture. Se if that works.

 

Kind regards,

 

Pickwick

 

+1 Did you wash it out before you used it?

[ClassicHippie]

One of the tips given on FPN is to flush the pen with a tiny drop of dish washing liquid in warm water, to get rid of the substances used in manufacture. Se if that works.

 

Kind regards,

 

Pickwick

 

+1 Did you wash it out before you used it?

 

No, I read the directions that came with it. I don't remember it saying anything about washing the pen out first. It worked fine the first 15 minutes I used it and then wouldn't work after resting. I didn't think if it worked right away that it would need washing out, but this is my first one. Should I just turn the piston until all the ink comes out and then fill it up with water?

[Yoda4561]

Whoever is putting the pens together is rather liberal with the piston greasing, it's possible they put a bit too much on and a bit of it got onto the feed. You'll get it working again for sure, but you may need to give it a good flushing with some soapy water first, should be good unless they managed to grease the feed too.

 

If a basic flushing fails, take note of the current nib and feed setting, pull the nib and feed and give them a good cleaning as well as the inside of the section where the feed sits. Nathan has a handy video somewhere on youtube of how to pop the nib in and out, it's a very simple procedure, you just need to remember how deep to fit the nib and feed.

 

Both of mine improved with a soapy water flush, and they start up right away after being nib up for a day or two in the coffee cup'o fountain pens. The flex of the nib is very dependent on how deep the nib is set into the pen, 1 or 2mm further out and it becomes much softer, yours may just be set a bit deeper than it should be.

[Fuddlestack]

Maybe Brian's new stock will work better. I've just signed up for notification on one of these.

[jpeck]

First of all, Noodler's flex nib is not of high quality by any means. You get what you paid for.

My experience with it and pretty much all reviews say that it requires enormous pressure to get line variation, and too much pressure pressure breaks the flow.

 

Second, to prevent drying-up, you may plug the vent hole in the cap. I think that hole shouldn't really be there.

[GouletPens]

All good advice everyone, I hardly have anything to add. It does seem like about 90% of the Noodler's Flex pen users out there love them, but the other 10% are running into issues like this. Flushing is a great start, then adjusting the nib is the next step. These things are fairly fickle, they're not like a Lamy where you just jam in the nib and go. A little tweaking and adjusting can make or break the writing experience with this pen. I've had a lot of requests to do a video on adjusting these pens, and I'm going to look to do that as soon as I'm able.

[FearNot]

I had the same problem with a Noodler's Aeromatic Ebonite pen. Dried out and didn't want to start back up. Finally, I emptied it out gave it a good flush and put it away until after the holidays.

Edited December 22, 2010 by FearNot

[indigirl]

I just got mine too (Brian rocks as hard as ever!) & I'm having a fine old time with it. I didn't flush mine, just filled it right up w/ the Black Swan (of course). Haven't had any problems. There have been a few descenders where the ink flow didn't keep up w/ my high speed at maximum flex , but that is a user issue, I believe. It's nice to have a flex pen that I can just kinda whale on to get max flex w/o worrying about damaging the nib -- not that it takes that much pressure to flex, I'm just not quite as careful about how hard I press or how fast I take some curves; it's kind of like some dip nibs I've used. Cheap flex, it's a game changer! I'm sold, now I want one of the color ones!

[ClassicHippie]

http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb189/classichippie313/IMG_0710.jpg

 

I flushed it with soapy water, clear water, took out the nib and cleaned all that, put it back together (nib a little farther out). Filled it with Australian Roses and at first, once again, it worked great. Then, the same problems started. If I stop writing for more than 8-10 seconds, it takes a while to start up. I use the same pressure throughout and it will write very wet and then suddenly go very dry.

Sorry the photo isn't the best- I just used my phone and the white balance is off. I was hoping that seeing an example of the issues might help. I really like the flex nib when it works, but it keeps going dry and is so inconsistent!

[watch_art]

take it apart and clean out feed with a bit of naptha/ lighter fluid/ kerosene.

 

good luck.

[ClassicHippie]

take it apart and clean out feed with a bit of naptha/ lighter fluid/ kerosene.

 

good luck.

 

I haven't done this before- how exactly would I clean it?

[Edgar Allan Bo]

Has somebody tried to carve a bigger/deeper ink slit in the feed!?! I do that with all my LAMY feeds (Lamy's are pretty dry) and they're all wet writers now.

 

I'm waiting since 2 weeks for my Noodlers flex pen, maybe it will take some more days because of the christmas/snow-chaos in europe...

[watch_art]

take it apart and clean out feed with a bit of naptha/ lighter fluid/ kerosene.

 

good luck.

 

I haven't done this before- how exactly would I clean it?

 

 

soak it and then use a cheap china bristol paint brush to scrub it while it's still in the fluid. then rinse it wash it off really good, dry it off, put it back together.

[atypical]

Does it work properly with a different ink such as e.g. Waterman Florida Blue?

[ClassicHippie]

Does it work properly with a different ink such as e.g. Waterman Florida Blue?

 

I tried it with 1670, which is the only other bottled ink I have since I haven't been at this long. It does the same thing- starts up great and then fluctuates between super wet and super dry. Do you think it's the inks?

[dazygrl02]

I have little experience with fountain pens, but what you're saying and the pattern the writing shows almost looks like no ink is actually coming out of the pen and that the initial wet writing is just residual from you dipping the pen into the bottle. It's possible that you have a clog... If it's easy to do, you should take the pen apart and check it out since nothing else is working. Well, good luck.

[Yoda4561]

Does it work properly with a different ink such as e.g. Waterman Florida Blue?

 

I tried it with 1670, which is the only other bottled ink I have since I haven't been at this long. It does the same thing- starts up great and then fluctuates between super wet and super dry. Do you think it's the inks?

 

I doubt it's the ink. While ink does have an effect it should at least write with slight flex like you're using without issue. Mine only tend to railroad on certain papers or when I make a sudden sidways movement while flexing heavily out to 1.5mm.

 

Is your nib and feed set exactly like this?

 

http://i141.photobucket.com/albums/r54/Yoda4561/Pens%20and%20Ink/nibset.jpg