Can Ink Eat Away The Gold ....

[sirmartin]

Hello everyone,

 

I have done some searching but could not find the answer on the FPN forum. So that is why I post the question.

Does anyone have experience that ink can corrode away the gold on a gold plated nib?

 

In my case it is a about a Parker 45 I bought, the pen has been used. The sellers tells me the acidity of the ink has eaten away the gold.

I give him the benefit of the doubt, but I have much doubts. My doubts are that the nib is not the original nib.

 

My thought about it is that not the whole nib is in contact with the ink, so there should be some gold left on the nib. I can not find a trace of gold, not even under a microscope.

And the ink I tested at the lab where more neutral ..so pH of around 7. Ok I do not know which ink was used in the pen. I saw some residue of blue ink. The pen has been used frequently.

I do not have enough long term experience with gold plated nibs and ink. I have a Sheaffer from 1998 and one who is from more recent times I do not use them every day but both nibs seem fine.

 

 

Thanks,

Martin

 

Martin, there can be some wear to a gold plated steel nib due to exposure to ink. I have posted some pictures in this 2009 thread of how the gold plating wore on a supposedly good quality GP steel nib. link.

 

HTH

 

Hari

Hi Hari,

 

That are interesting pics. that is the way I have imagined a nib would be damaged.

 

Thanks,

Martin

[dfurlano]

My two cents...

 

Steel nibs are really stainless steel and difficult to gold plate. There usually has to be some sort of etching done to the stainless to get nickel to stick. Once you get the nickle on then you move to gold.

 

Again my opinion is that what Hari is experiencing with the schmidt nibs is poor sub-straight preping and the gold coming off. I don't think it is gold dissolving but there are different type of gold plating process some that use cyanide and other that are non-cyanide based..

 

Additionally, on a fully plated nib I would expect the gold to rub off where the nib hits the paper. If in fact the plating were pealing or ink somehow getting under the plating (microns thick plating) that would be where you would always see the plating coming off first...

 

Again just my opinion.

Edited November 17, 2012 by dfurlano

[sirmartin]

I knew about the function and reaction of "Königswasser" because the last time I used it in my lab (honestly) was only 35 years ago. I just did a Google check (no, not to see if everything above was correct or not) but to have a look at the history. Very interesting, that stuff about World War II and Nobel Prizes (which I didn't know about):

History

Aqua regia first appeared in the work of medieval European alchemist Pseudo-Geber, dating from the 14th century.^[10] Antoine Lavoisier called it nitro-muriatic acid in 1789.^[11]

When Germany invaded Denmark in World War II, Hungarian chemist George de Hevesy dissolved the gold Nobel Prizes of German physicists Max von Laue (1914) and James Franck (1925) in aqua regia to prevent the Nazis from confiscating them. The German government had prohibited Germans from accepting or keeping any Nobel Prize after jailed peace activist Carl von Ossietzky had received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1935. De Hevesy placed the resulting solution on a shelf in his laboratory at the Niels Bohr Institute. It was subsequently ignored by the Nazis who thought the jar—one of perhaps hundreds on the shelving—contained common chemicals. After the war, de Hevesy returned to find the solution undisturbed and precipitated the gold out of the acid. The gold was returned to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the Nobel Foundation. They re-cast the medals and again presented them to Laue and Franck.^[12][13]

 

Mike

 

Very interesting story ... that the gold returned to the Swedish Academy of Science and the Nobel Foundation and re-cast. And interesting where a gold and nib question takes us.

Thanks everyone for the explanations and the chemistry. It is for me also a long time ago since I had to study it in school.

I have about a kilogram of mercury lying around (safely stored) so if I want to dissolve some gold I give it a try It is mercury I used to save from clinical mercury manometer. Which are not allowed to be used anymore

[sirmartin]

My two cents...

 

Steel nibs are really stainless steel and difficult to gold plate. There usually has to be some sort of etching done to the stainless to get nickel to stick. Once you get the nickle on then you move to gold.

 

Again my opinion is that what Hari is experiencing with the schmidt nibs is poor sub-straight preping and the gold coming off. I don't think it is gold dissolving but there are different type of gold plating process some that use cyanide and other that are non-cyanide based..

 

Again just my opinion.

 

Yes It is interesting it could also be as you describe. if something in the etching process is not done right the gold will not stick to the nickel or the nickel to the steel. I remember once in my wild west days at school we could put gold on electric contacts by electrolyse. So I had the bright idea to do that trick to the cylinder of my stainless 44 magnum. With no knowledge about metallurgy. Well the trick worked but it did not last long, in the weeks after all the gold was wiped off.

It did not stick at all.

 

Martin

[mstone]

Gold plate on steel nibs isn't for corrosion resistance, only aesthetics. It is possible (and not really all that uncommon) for a plated steel nib to corrode and pit through imperfections in the plating. If the steel shows no sign of corrosion that's not what happened here. It's also possible for a thin gold plate to be removed mechanically, even accidentally. That said, Parker did make unplated steel nibs for the 45; is there any particular reason to believe this was ever a gold nib?

[lapis]

Well, the nib on m M215 is steel (with a dash of rhodium). It writes just as well as the goldies on my Ms 320, 800, 900 and 1000. Believe me! What some of you won't believe is that I did consider the possibility of exchanging the M215 nib with a goldie from an M200, but that looked really weird, not matching with the rest of the rhodium on the barrel.

 

Mike

[sirmartin]

Gold plate on steel nibs isn't for corrosion resistance, only aesthetics. It is possible (and not really all that uncommon) for a plated steel nib to corrode and pit through imperfections in the plating. If the steel shows no sign of corrosion that's not what happened here. It's also possible for a thin gold plate to be removed mechanically, even accidentally. That said, Parker did make unplated steel nibs for the 45; is there any particular reason to believe this was ever a gold nib?

Yes the pen is a parker 45 insignia the pen is gold platec and as far as i know should the nib also be gold plated.

Another member made this pic where I refer too:

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/uploads/post-81737-0-66406100-1327705355.jpg

[sirmartin]

Well, the nib on m M215 is steel (with a dash of rhodium). It writes just as well as the goldies on my Ms 320, 800, 900 and 1000. Believe me! What some of you won't believe is that I did consider the possibility of exchanging the M215 nib with a goldie from an M200, but that looked really weird, not matching with the rest of the rhodium on the barrel.

 

Mike

The nib writes fine. I have no problem with it not being gold. The 45s I saw on pics had gold nibs so that is why iI wondered if it could be eroded off somehow.

 

Martin

[mstone]

Gold plate on steel nibs isn't for corrosion resistance, only aesthetics. It is possible (and not really all that uncommon) for a plated steel nib to corrode and pit through imperfections in the plating. If the steel shows no sign of corrosion that's not what happened here. It's also possible for a thin gold plate to be removed mechanically, even accidentally. That said, Parker did make unplated steel nibs for the 45; is there any particular reason to believe this was ever a gold nib?

Yes the pen is a parker 45 insignia the pen is gold platec and as far as i know should the nib also be gold plated.

 

Parker made gold nibs and plated and unplated steel nibs. They came in different sizes and shapes, and were available separately. Changing the nib is a simple matter of unscrewing one assembly and replacing it with another. It was quite common for people to swap out nibs based on their preference, and this could have been done at the point of sale or at any time in the past N years.

[docspeed]

I have 2 pelikan M200 pens with gold plated nibs, the pens were filled with red and royal blue pelikan 4001 exclusively and in both pens the nibs have part of the gold plate dissolved where the ink was in constant contact with the nib.

 

I can supply photos to show this, so yes the gold plate which is very thin can be dissolved out by ink.

[sirmartin]

Parker made gold nibs and plated and unplated steel nibs. They came in different sizes and shapes, and were available separately. Changing the nib is a simple matter of unscrewing one assembly and replacing it with another. It was quite common for people to swap out nibs based on their preference, and this could have been done at the point of sale or at any time in the past N years.

 

Yes I have 3 Parker 45 now, I had removed the nibs too to check them unscrewed them but also took it appart, the capillair system out. Since I have more 45's I see the differences in time between the nibs.

It is fun to learn more about this pen and collect more colors and styles.

 

Martin

[sirmartin]

I have 2 pelikan M200 pens with gold plated nibs, the pens were filled with red and royal blue pelikan 4001 exclusively and in both pens the nibs have part of the gold plate dissolved where the ink was in constant contact with the nib.

 

I can supply photos to show this, so yes the gold plate which is very thin can be dissolved out by ink.

 

I have seen photo's of dissolved gold, the gold is dissolved on the places where the nib touched the ink. On my nib all the gold is gone or it looks more like a stainless nib.

The seller does not mention that the gold was dissolved and the rest maybe brushed off. His reaction is more like ... oh .. is the gold gone? and that he learned something, that ink can dissolve gold.

To me this story sounds awkward. That is why I started the question here, to ask the experts with experience.

And I learned a lot, things I did not even think about.