Parker Sonnet Ciselé rollerball 1st gen 1997 oddities? Authentic or is something fishy?

[Rodelion]

Dear fellow pen people,

 

Recently I acquired a Parker Sonnet Cisele set of a FP and a rollerball. I'm quite certain that the fountain pen checks out: the nib polishes up well, and all the hallmarks on the nib look perfect. The rollerball is an odd one though.

 

(1) According to the cap markings the FP is from 1994 and the rollerball from 1997. Can there be a three year difference in the original set, or can I assume they've been bought seperately? Maybe there was a mixup (check question 3).

(2) This goes for both pens: the markings on the cap ring are a bit sloppy. I've seen this in photos online on more Sonnet Ciselés, but there are also some 1st gen pens that have very sharp, neat imprints. I assume the stamps used during the first years were probably just not very accurately made, and suffered from premature wear, causing the sloppy imprints. Can others compare my markings with their own 1st gen Sonnets and confirm? (They may look great with bare eyes -- magnifier or microscope is needed).

(3) The grid pattern on the cap is totally SMOOTH. This is visible on the second photo. The cap weighs *exactly* 11.63 grams though, just like the FP's cap with the usual textured grid.  Does anyone know anything about smooth Ciselé caps or barrels existing?
(4) The section of the rollerball is in two parts, with two golden rings, which I've seen on Sonnets before, but not on a Ciselé. Were they ever produced that way, or was it likely replaced?

(5) The plastic parts of the section are also loose. They freely rotate. I've found online this is quite common with Sonnet sections. Does anyone know how to fix? I don't dare to try and rotate or pull anything with brute force, because the inner tube is so thin and seems fragile.

 

Thank you for helping me satisfy my curiosities!

 

(The first ten pictures show the rollerball, and the last eight show the FP).

[MisterP]

I have recently sold the last of my Cisele sonnets so sorry I can't comment on authenticity. I think it highly unlikely that they were originally bought as a set. Parker usually only sold FP sets with Ballpen or Pencil.

[thx1138]

The RB looks genuine to me. All the markings look right for French production of stirling silver sonnets.

 

I have a faint memory of some chisele models having the grooves filled with paint and then the lands are polished,  followed by a clear coat.

 

I have a number of this model sonnet and I will dig them out to see if any are similar to yours.

[thx1138]

Whoops. The mysterious double post.

[torstar]

If the FP works it is clearly a fake...

 

 

[jchch1950]

10 hours ago, torstar said:

If the FP works it is clearly a fake...

 

 

??? All of them?

[Rodelion]

16 hours ago, thx1138 said:

The RB looks genuine to me. All the markings look right for French production of stirling silver sonnets.

 

I have a faint memory of some chisele models having the grooves filled with paint and then the lands are polished,  followed by a clear coat.

 

I have a number of this model sonnet and I will dig them out to see if any are similar to yours.

That would be great! I can imagine that stamp quality varied a lot between, and also during, production runs.

Nice to hear the cap is possibly also original. The exact same weight of the two different caps is very striking. But I doubt a pen would be sold with a textured barrel and a smooth cap. That would be weird. Maybe someone made a mistake mixing up his pen parts, and there's another pen out there that has a smooth barrel and a textured cap!

[Rodelion]

13 hours ago, torstar said:

If the FP works it is clearly a fake...

 

 

You must have had bad luck then. ☹️ Yes, there have been production runs with quality issues, but everyone who's sufficiently familiar with genuine Sonnet FPs knows that altough they're arguably overpriced, most of them are decent pens.

[Beechwood]

1 hour ago, Rodelion said:

You must have had bad luck then. ☹️ Yes, there have been production runs with quality issues, but everyone who's sufficiently familiar with genuine Sonnet FPs knows that altough they're arguably overpriced, most of them are decent pens.

 

 

I have bought one Sonnet, had two given and have helped others with the problems on Sonnets that they encountered. The issues have been on the gold ring retaining the feed working loose as the cap is removed causing ink to leak into the cap and then on to the fingers.

 

A design and manufacturing blunder. Parker Service had five attempts at fixing the issue and finally admitted 'we cannot fix this pen' they sent it back unrepaired. I am aware that Parker were overwhelmed with guarantee claims for Sonnets in the 1990s.

 

Fake Parker Sonnets do not have this design problem, at least on the two that I have seen.

 

I have no knowledge of this but it is possible that late Sonnets have fixed the problem.

 

The only okay part of a Sonnet is the gold bib but as Shakespeare said, 'Damned by faint praise'

 

 

 

 

[Rodelion]

3 hours ago, Beechwood said:

 

 

I have bought one Sonnet, had two given and have helped others with the problems on Sonnets that they encountered. The issues have been on the gold ring retaining the feed working loose as the cap is removed causing ink to leak into the cap and then on to the fingers.

 

A design and manufacturing blunder. Parker Service had five attempts at fixing the issue and finally admitted 'we cannot fix this pen' they sent it back unrepaired. I am aware that Parker were overwhelmed with guarantee claims for Sonnets in the 1990s.

 

Fake Parker Sonnets do not have this design problem, at least on the two that I have seen.

 

I have no knowledge of this but it is possible that late Sonnets have fixed the problem.

 

The only okay part of a Sonnet is the gold bib but as Shakespeare said, 'Damned by faint praise'

 

 

 

 

The issue of ink leaking into the cap, is considered a quality control issue, because there are also many Sonnets, in all generations, without that problem. Unfortunately it seems that, at least so far, the Sonnet-series is not popular enough among enthusiasts to isolate the problem. I've got a 2007 Sonnet Ciselé that leaks some ink from the feed unto the nib sometimes, which is annoying indeed, and definitely a design flaw. But it's not so bad that the pen is a leaking hazzard. Others have worse experiences. There's at least a lack of machining tolerance control. It's sad that there's just not enough data to isolate the problem, and that Parker, or what's left of Parker, doesn't do much to fix the problem. There are a lot of Sonnets in different generations that are very pretty pens, but if they don't work right, that defeats the entire purpose of it being a pen -- a pen that's used.

[torstar]

5 hours ago, Rodelion said:

You must have had bad luck then. ☹️ Yes, there have been production runs with quality issues, but everyone who's sufficiently familiar with genuine Sonnet FPs knows that altough they're arguably overpriced, most of them are decent pens.

 

There were more than a few batches that were garbage, dried up in 5 seconds, sent it back 3 times, they basically told me to eat poop and die.

 

(More than a few of us on here were totally ripped off...)

 

It could have been a great pen, Parker could have done even the most remotely decent thing and replace it or refunded it, cost around $250 all those years ago, oh well, praying quality control cares about the next pen i buy.

 

[Rodelion]

2 minutes ago, torstar said:

 

There were more than a few batches that were garbage, dried up in 5 seconds, sent it back 3 times, they basically told me to eat poop and die.

 

It could have been a great pen, cost around $250 all those years ago, oh well, praying quality control cares about the next pen i buy.

 

Yes! Quality control was horrible, and customer service too. But the 'bad Sonnets' were just batches. Most of them are fine. At least, that's the consensus of most buyers and collectors. That's only my experience. All that aside, it's very obvious that the Parker of today is not what it was before the nineties.