I Killed My Hero 359 Feed

[jabberwock11]

I just received a Hero 359 (Safari clone) in the mail today and, after some writing, I decided to throw a Lamy 1.1 nib onto the thing...unfortunately the Hero's nib seemed to be glued in place. It took quite a bit of work to get the stupid thing off, and when I did the Lamy nib did not seem to fit the feed. Being an enterprising guy I decided to file down the shoulders on the feed so that my nib would fit. Long story short, the feed did not cooperate and in a dremel rage I carved that thing up.

 

I was pretty upset by this, as I was under the impression that Hero 359 nibs came off as easily as Lamy nibs, and that the two were interchangeable. I wonder if the good folks over at Hero have made some adjustments, or if I just happened to get an oddball Hero 359.

 

In any event, I am on the hunt for a feed to fit a Hero 359. Now, I know that I could just buy a new Hero, but I dislike having perfectly good pen bodies sitting around doing nothing. I thought that I saw a listing on eBay for some feeds, but I can no longer find it (and it's entirely possible that these were actually Jinhao feeds). I have put an add up on the classifieds here, but I am not holding out much hope.

 

If anyone has any insight into the interchangeability of the Hero 359 with the Lamy Safari, I would appreciate the info. Also, if anyone can point me in the right direction as far as Hero 359 feeds go I would be eternally grateful.

Edited October 30, 2015 by jabberwock11

[Ian the Jock]

I don't know about the hero feeds but the jinhao feeds can be found under "tongues" you could try the search with hero tongues on ebay China.

 

Hope this helps

Good luck

 

Ian

[jabberwock11]

Never in a million years would I have guessed to search under "tongues" for feeds. The Jinhao feeds popped up, which is nice to know, but no hero feeds.

 

It's looking more and more like I'm just going to have to buy a new whole pen. It seems like such a waste.

[Nosferatualso]

Hi I wondered if you ever did find a new feed. I have tried a range of hero 359s, and I have found that the only ones where I can remove the nibs are some of the medium nibs. The other nibs are glued to the feed

[jabberwock11]

No, I ended up replacing the pen.

[Nosferatualso]

I'm sorry. Did you get another Hero?

[jabberwock11]

Yes, I got the exact same pen and ground the nib into an italic. I would have preferred to swap the nib with a Lamy stub, but that wasn't possible.

[Raem99]

I've heard that the Heros write fairly poorly. How's your experience thus far?

[Nosferatualso]

They're ok. But much better with the Lamy nib. I was just looking for something cheap for work. But with the 1.1 nib, I would have been better buying a Lamy joy

[Erik Dalton]

I'm sorry for all you went through, but I think we all learned quite a bit from your post. The tongues revelation alone, is something I wound never in a million years stumbled on.

Glad to hear of your demel rage. Nice to know I'm not the only one who gets those...lol..

[dogpoet]

I just hear somebody saying "Demel Rage" ponderously in a croaky voice like they're talking over a trailer for an '80s horror film...

[jabberwock11]

I learned a lot from this experience (not the least of which is that Hero 359 pens currently have nibs that are, for the most part, not removable). I really just wanted to be able to use a variety of low cost colorful pens with Lamy nibs, and that was not what ended up happening. I like Lamy Safaris, but I have always felt that they were really overpriced, I figured that the Hero 359 with a nice Lamy nib would be a better option for every day use. Sadly, this was not the case. I have read that the Hero 359 nibs were pretty much all removable in the past, but that this was changed fairly recently...I guess I missed the boat.

 

My thoughts on the Hero 359 are that they are nice enough pens with nibs that just do not work for me. The Medium nibs are way too wet and not nearly as smooth as I would like. Ground to an italic the Hero 359 nib is OK, but that was not why I bought the pen, so I largely see this endeavor as frustrating, but low cost, failure. I did end up buying some "tongues" to replace some busted feeds on other pens, so I guess I came away on top (seriously, I would have never guessed to look for feeds under the name "fountain pen tongues").

 

On a side note, I imagine that if a PSA about dremel rage had been available then all of this could have been avoided...('Taking a grinding wheel to a particularly stubborn pen seems like a fun way to let off some aggression, but dremel rage is real and it can be deadly. How many of us have destroyed a project due to frustration and a readily available dremel? When you feel the rage coming on put down the dremel. You can always take a break and start over with a fresh head, grinding away your anger is never the answer. The pen you save could be your own.' The more you know...)

[Erik Dalton]

I'm sorry for all you went through, but I think we all learned quite a bit from your post. The tongues revelation alone, is something I wound never in a million years stumbled on.

Glad to hear of your demel rage. Nice to know I'm not the only one who gets those...lol..

I was speaking tongue in cheek about "Dremel rage".. I learned a long time ago to take my time while working on a pen..sometimes even putting it down and starting fresh another day. I've rebuilt hundreds of pens now and am still learning. My intent was to make you feel a little better about your experience. I can see now, that was not necessary..sorry.

I did learn valuable information from your experience, and I thank you for that.

[jabberwock11]

Yeah, I got that. The PSA (Public Service Announcement) thing was in the tone of those cheesy 80s PSAs. It's sometimes difficult to convey tone on-line, especially when that tone consists of dry humor or sarcasm.

[Nosferatualso]

Hi I just bought a blue Hero 359 from Inshaallah a lovely UK vendor. I don't know him, I've just had good service. And I was able to pull the nib off last night

[jabberwock11]

There are a few 359s still running around with removable nibs, but the consensus seems to be that these are the exceptions and not the rule.

 

I've done a lot of checking into this and while I could stumble upon some 359s with removable nibs, I am just not willing to put any more time or effort into the endeavor. It's just not worth it to me.

[bob_hayden]

I've heard that the Heros write fairly poorly. How's your experience thus far?

 

I have two 359As -- the sherbet with whipped cream pens. One was grape sherbet and I put just a little purple ink in it to make sure it was OK and it was. It's been on the shelf since then. The other was licorice sherbet and that one was in use for weeks. I had been messing with some Thornton Lamy-style black ink cartridges that failed to flow more often than not. The only pen in which it worked reliably for a while was a Safari. So I thought I would try it in the 359A. It worked even better there. In fact, the 359A was better in every respect than the Lamy, which was a good pen itself. This is a small sample, and Chinese pens show a lot of variability, but this was certainly the best Hero pen I have ever used.