A rubber bodied pen has become sticky to the touch

[mafpolo]

I have a rubber bodied fountain pen. It is not an antique pen. I have had it for about ten years, and now it has become sticky to the touch. Anyone have an idea how to get rid of the sticky to get it back to hard rubber/plastic feel?

[Federalist Pens]

Maybe good 'ole soap and water to get some of the residue/dirt off.

What kind/model pen is it?

[mafpolo]

Frankiex, it is a Stypen. I know...not a great pen, but I tend to keep what writes well. So, I have some really nice pens, as well as some really not so special cheap stuff. I like the way my Dtypen's write, so I keep them.

 

I will try the soap & water. Thanks for the tip.

[mafpolo]

Soap and H2O didn't work. Also, it really hasn't gotten this way from dirt, etc. It has actually been sitting for a while. Any other suggestions?

[publius]

That's tricky. I know that certain solvents will do that to rubber, so they're avoided when working on machinery with parts of that material ; but I've never heard of anything which would undo the damage. If you work in a metallurgical laboratory, you could try heating to drive off the volatile solvent (if present), then heating further under an atmosphere of hydrogen sulphide to re-polymerize the isoprene, but that's not really a good idea & might not work anyway.

[spotted and speckled]

I haven't tried this on a pen but in theory it should work. Orange oil dissolves adhesives and general crud, but I don't know if it would completely destroy the rubber. Ammonia maybe? Have you looked on Richard Binder's site to see if he has any pointers?