Alt Replacement For Pilot Con-20

[bedlam]

Or how to make a Knight into an Esterbrook.

You may know the Pilot Knight, an entry level pen that I find is a solid everyday writer, dang near bomb proof with it's steel construction and hard as nails finish. (the pen in these photos is about 10 years old)

 

 

 

I've grown quite fond of this Corolla of the pen world and use it with the basic Con-20 converter.

 

 

Pilot, in their infinite wisdom, have decided to discontinue the Con-20 (and Con-50 as confirmed by Classic Fountain Pens) and I discover this just as I was thinking of replacing my Con-20 as the sac had herniated under the press tab so far that it rubbed against the body when being reinserted into the barrel. To add insult to injury, Pilot is replacing both the 20 and the 50 with the Con-40 that holds half as much ink. Errrr.

What to do? I decided to take matters into my own hands.

I cleaned both pen and converter in prep for surgery. My first thought was to remove the sac from the converter and replace that.

 

 

If you look closely, you will see a tiny lip of plastic beyond the end of the metal jacket of the converter, I took a dental spatula and attempted to ease this fitting out of the end of the jacket. After half an hour getting nowhere, the jacket being well crimped onto the fitting, I pressed hard with the spatula and deformed the stupid piece of plastic and finally managed to pull it out of there with forceps. Just as well, the fitting and the actual sac were not strongly attached anymore and came apart easily.

 

 

Now that I had the sac out of the metal jacket, it looked familiar. It looked like a #16 sac, the same that fits Esterbrooks and I even happen to have one on hand. The stars must be aligned, this never happens!

 

 

There they are, side by side, and dang! The #16 fits perfectly on the section of the Pilot Knight.

 

 

 

Cut to length, sac in place, the only thing is the metal jacket doesn't fit snug over the sac and section, and sac shellac is not strong enough to hold it (note excess shellac in photo). I think I will cut and apply a second layer of sac, left over from cutting to length, and that might snug the metal jacket in place. Even unsecured it's not bad, the jacket rattles a bit inside the barrel, but the pen functions great. I haven't measured but I expect it is restored to the original ink quantity .9 ml, while the replacement Pilot Con-40 is rated at .4 ml.

 

Grant Petersen, of Rivendell bike fame, once said "if you find something you really like, buy a lifetime supply because the manufacturer will change it just because they can" and that is certainly how I feel in this case, and perhaps why I felt strongly enough to take a working pen into surgery.

Edited July 31, 2017 by bedlam

[Algester]

you could have done it more elegantly... <_<

not saying you could use the heat gun approach

either way to me the CON-40 is better as it's a compromise between the CON-20 and CON-50 and actually has decent active ink capacity

IE not all Pilot pens can fit the con-50 but can fit the CON-20 but not all CON-20s were made the same (IE Metal shroud some doesnt even have it but just a basic press barif you know what the original 1st gen Parallel came with its that)

Edited July 31, 2017 by Algester

[bedlam]

Oh yeah, granted, I could have spent a lot more time to finesse a solution, but this is more of a revenge repair.

 

It's obvious the Pilot plan is to discard and replace, hence the crimping of the metal jacket onto the plastic fitting. I'm just not willing to be led down the Throw Away path to the smaller Con-40 with new, improved, Agitator Balls. I don't buy any of that. Plus I'm a bottle ink guy all the way, so being able to go back to cartridges was not a consideration.

 

Also I needed to get this done on a Sunday morning before my young daughter woke up, sees all my pen gear on the living room table, and wants to 'Try a little' of my orange shellac, and in the wink of an eye, OOPS.

 

Epilogue: the metal jacket did adhere to the section over the sac. The assembly looks nearly identical to a regular Knight equipped with a Con-20, the third photo from the top is the finished repair. My trusty Knight was ready to go to work with me on Monday morning.

Edited July 31, 2017 by bedlam

[KellyMcJ]

Nice!!!!! Keep us updated on how it works out in the long run.

[Driften]

There are sill con-20's available out in the wild from dealers that have not sold all of the ones they had in stock. For example indy-pen-dance.com still has them in stock for $4.50ea. I bought two about a month ago from them for my VP's. I hated the con-50 in that pen.

[Algester]

well since you already removed the nipple from the shroud you can use shellac, a Pilot Cartridge to pretty much bring it back

you can remove the shroud from the crimping again as I said heat gun approach hence more elegantly

Edited August 1, 2017 by Algester

[bedlam]

Oh yeah, that's a good approach and preserves the ability to use cartridges. Next time for sure, for now the sac direct to the section is working great for me. Maybe when this sac wears out. Like I mentioned, this is my everyday, shirt pocket pen, not like my Aurora or anything.

Edited August 1, 2017 by bedlam

[bedlam]

Epilogue: Went to fill this pen after a long fallow period only to discover it would only draw a small amount of ink. Disassembled to discover a rotten oval on the sac the size, shape and texture of a raisin. It directly corresponded to the oval opening of the section throat below it. I believe the feed inside the section is made of a material not compatible with a latex sac. In hindsight I remember the original sac was of a plastic material, but at the time I thought nothing of it.

So much for improvised repair. I've already ordered a genuine Pilot converter replacement.

[Cyclohexene]

Damn, I remember reading this thread years ago, kudos for taking the effort to update the folks on your long term experience.

[aurore]

CON-40 rocks! Converter & musical instrument - 2 in 1. What a brilliant stuff!

[awa54]

I'm a fan of just refilling empty cartridges, if you have patience and a steady hand you can even stuff the little plastic plug back in the throat of a Pilot cart and have custom color cartridges that are safe for local transport (I wouldn't go putting a refill like that in the pocket of a white shirt or take it on a plane though!). As a bonus refilled carts hold more ink than any converter other than a CON-70.