Zoltan

[Lennart Wennberg]

This pen, that I acquired last weekend in my home town Umeå, was presented 1958 to Miss Gun Jonsson who worked at a hotel in Umeå by the Swedish actor Fritjof Billquist. Oviously a Vacumatic copy, but does anyone know something about Zoltan pens? Zoltan sounds Hungarian to me...

 

Lennart

 

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20010.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20011.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20012.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e6b75d736.photos.live.com/self.aspx/Inf%c3%b6r%20publicering/Inf%c3%b6r%20publicering%20013.jpg

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20015.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20016.jpg

[Chthulhu]

I suggest that you post your images somewhere where we can see them without having to be Windows Live members, or make your images public if that's possible.

[Lennart Wennberg]

I'm so sorry. I tried in a lot of ways but nothing worked. I don't know how to shrink the original mega Mb picture to a smaller version on my hard drive.

 

Once again. I'm so sorry for your inconvenience and I'll return when I get this working out.( I've managed to post pictures before. I don't know why not this time.)

 

Lennart

 

 

[Lennart Wennberg]

Does it work this time?

 

 

Edited March 9, 2011 by Lennart Wennberg

[Lennart Wennberg]

 

 

 

Edited March 9, 2011 by Lennart Wennberg

[Scrawler]

I have never come across this pen before. Is it a vacuum filler or a button filler?

[Lennart Wennberg]

Sorry for me being so badly prepared before starting this thread but I just discovered, that the knob under the blind cap can be turned and it is a...... Piston filler. And I thought it was like a Vac with a diaphragm.

[Scrawler]

Sorry for me being so badly prepared before starting this thread but I just discovered, that the knob under the blind cap can be turned and it is a...... Piston filler. And I thought it was like a Vac with a diaphragm.

That is cool. Can you post a picture of the nib?

[Lennart Wennberg]

[Scrawler]

There is not a lot of information available about the Nichroma nib. It appears to have been made in Germany. Your pen is a real mystery. There are certainly not a lot of them about. They symbol on Nichroma nibs looks like a buffalo. They must have been a small time, and now defunct German nib maker. I will do some more digging.

[Scrawler]

Here is another piston filler pen with a Nichroma nib.

 

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/index.php?/topic/25423-can-you-help-me-identify-this-pen/page__view__findpost__p__233485

 

The fact that yours is a piston filler tends to suggest German ancestry, and I am fairly sure that the nib is German. A number of German nib manufacturers stamped their nibs with an animal motif in a similar manner.

[Scrawler]

That might be a Penol pen, made in Copenhagen by Christian Olsen. The Nichroma brand nib seems to be a sub brand of Penol made in Germany for school pens. The nib looks like it dates to the 1950s, but the body seems older, like 1939-1940. That ZOLTAN on it may be an owners name.

[Lennart Wennberg]

Scrawler,

 

It reminds me of Perfecto, a German no-name piston filler, who got its name stamped on the body as it was imported. Perhaps it was called something else in another country.

[rhr]

The Nichroma brand nib seems to be a sub brand of Penol made in Germany for school pens.

Are you sure about the connection to Penol? It looks like those nibs were used on many brands, including Tropen. There is also some connection to a company named SBIK. Does anyone know more about the latter company?

 

I looked for a trademark for "Nichroma" on this website http://trade.mar.cx/, but I couldn't find one. I did find one for "Nichrome", a trademark for "ALLOYS OF NICKEL, CHROMIUM AND IRON CONTAINING LESS THAN THIRTY PERCENT IRON" that goes back to 1908. The nibmakers might have tried to get around the trademarked word by using this slight variation in the spelling. The trademark was probably not allowed because it was deemed to be too close to "Nichrome", so they decided to go ahead and used the unprotected name. Perhaps they never even tried to get a trademark. The only clue left is the buffalo or bison image on the nib. I searched for the words "buffalo" and "bison" on the trade.mar.cx site and found lots of images of the animal, but not the one on this "bison nib".

 

Bruce Speary has an image of a no-name German pen with a bison nib on his website on this page.

http://www.pensandwatches.com/otherpens.html

 

Here's the pen.

http://www.pensandwatches.com/images/pens/900s/p950.jpg

http://www.pensandwatches.com/images/pens/900s/p950b.jpg

 

And here's the nib.

 

http://www.pensandwatches.com/images/pens/900s/p950d.jpg

 

 

Here's an image of a Nichroma nib that I found on Google by someone with the username cloud9driver on Photobucket. It is subtitled "Nib from unidentified fountain pen".

 

http://i188.photobucket.com/albums/z178/cloud9driver/Vintage%20Fountain%20Pens/NichromaExtraNib.jpg

 

George Kovalenko.

 

[UncleNick]

The only Zoltan I'm familiar with from childhood:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoltan,_Hound_of_Dracula_(film)

 

Let's hope it's not related...

[Lennart Wennberg]

The Nichroma brand nib seems to be a sub brand of Penol made in Germany for school pens.

Are you sure about the connection to Penol? It looks like those nibs were used on many brands, including Tropen. There is also some connection to a company named SBIK. Does anyone know more about the latter company?

 

I looked for a trademark for "Nichroma" on this website http://trade.mar.cx/, but I couldn't find one. I did find one for "Nichrome", a trademark for "ALLOYS OF NICKEL, CHROMIUM AND IRON CONTAINING LESS THAN THIRTY PERCENT IRON" that goes back to 1908. The nibmakers might have tried to get around the trademarked word by using this slight variation in the spelling. The trademark was probably not allowed because it was deemed to be too close to "Nichrome", so they decided to go ahead and used the unprotected name. Perhaps they never even tried to get a trademark. The only clue left is the buffalo or bison image on the nib. I searched for the words "buffalo" and "bison" on the trade.mar.cx site and found lots of images of the animal, but not the one on this "bison nib".

 

Bruce Speary has an image of a no-name German pen with a bison nib on his website on this page.

http://www.pensandwa.../otherpens.html

 

Here's the pen.

http://www.pensandwa...s/900s/p950.jpg

http://www.pensandwa.../900s/p950b.jpg

 

And here's the nib.

 

http://www.pensandwatches.com/images/pens/900s/p950d.jpg

 

 

Here's an image of a Nichroma nib that I found on Google by someone with the username cloud9driver on Photobucket. It is subtitled "Nib from unidentified fountain pen".

 

http://i188.photobucket.com/albums/z178/cloud9driver/Vintage%20Fountain%20Pens/NichromaExtraNib.jpg

 

George Kovalenko.

 

 

Thank you so much for your extensive resarch!

 

I've cleaned and lubricated the pen and it is in perfect working order, with clean ink window with spiral pattern, and with good piston sealing!

 

Lennart

[Strand]

This pen, that I acquired last weekend in my home town Umeå, was presented 1958 to Miss Gun Jonsson who worked at a hotel in Umeå by the Swedish actor Fritjof Billquist. Oviously a Vacumatic copy, but does anyone know something about Zoltan pens? Zoltan sounds Hungarian to me...

 

Lennart

 

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20010.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20011.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20012.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e6b75d736.photos.live.com/self.aspx/Inf%c3%b6r%20publicering/Inf%c3%b6r%20publicering%20013.jpg

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20015.jpg

 

https://cid-db82411e...ering%20016.jpg

 

 

Lennart your pen is quite exotic, it is actually swedish. I have not been able to obtain much information on the manufacturer except that the Zoltan pens were made in Sundsvall by AB Ingvar Nord. As far as I can tell they were in the pen manufacturing business from about 1948 and were still manufacturing pens in the mid 1960's (I guess moving from fountain pens to ball points as time progressed). They remained in business until 1993 but I believe they stopped manufacturing pens or penrelated material some time well before that.

 

Not a common find at all.

Par

Edited March 10, 2011 by Strand

[Lennart Wennberg]

Wow,

 

Thank you Pär!

 

Incredible, made in the province of Norrland, Sweden! I've never heard of this manufacturer before. I've heard about the Runa fountain pen, from your site, but never this.

 

From the exterior it's similar to a Parker Vacumatic. I'm not sure it's really cellouid but it could possibly be. The nib is OK and the piston works perfectly with a triplet sealing. The ink window is, after cleaning, perfectly clear with spiral pattern. The least impressive with this pen is the clip with some unevenesss underneath so it could possibly cause some tearing to the shirt pocket.

 

The pen was presented to Miss Gun Jonsson as a thank you gift for a car ride to a gig. Mr Fritjof Billquist was married to the Swedish WWII singer Ulla Billquist.

 

Thank you all for participating in this!

 

Lennart

[rhr]

Par, interesting pen site you have. I see you already have the Zoltan there. But how about the Nichroma buffalo nib? Do you know any more about it? It seems to appear on many different brands of fountain pens.

 

George Kovalenko.

 

[Strand]

Par, interesting pen site you have. I see you already have the Zoltan there. But how about the Nichroma buffalo nib? Do you know any more about it? It seems to appear on many different brands of fountain pens.

 

George Kovalenko.

 

 

George,

 

thanks - I will if I ever get time translate the site to english and add some more materials... Unfortunately, Nichroma Buffalo (Bison?) nibs are not at all familiar to me. I have only seen it on Zoltan pens and never on any of the other swedish manufacturers pens. I am afraid I cannot provide any insights at all. I did search and browse around a bit and noted this entry ont he penexchange board.

 

http://www.penexchange.de/forum_neu/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2066

 

Note the buffalo on the 14k nib of unknown origins. It is sort of leading me to expect that the Nichrome label may not be a trademark or brand name and the key to identify the maker is int he buffalo?

 

 

 

 

Par

Edited March 11, 2011 by Strand