Fountain Ink Pen Acquisitions

markamonaghan said:
Was this new or a refurbished one? I've been looking for one for a while.
Click to expand...
Hi this was an original one in good condition. I can't see any on Barry's site but he has stock that he has not put up so he might have one lying around. The new one is overpriced crap according to the majority on FPN. You can get a nice original for the price of the boggo stainless nib new one (which has a cheap Jotter nib) He is an organist and choirmaster (famous one) and pen collecting and dealing is a sideline. He's in his 80s so old school and does not rip you off. Ex St Pauls and St Albans. If you know your choral music you will know Barry:


If you can't wait there is a nice one here for £85 boxed (mine was without box but in a plastic tube container provided by Barry with original photocopied instructions) I can't speak for the dealer here as never used them.

https://www.penamie.co.uk/html/parker/parker.html
 
The Parker 51 is very special to me, a pen of history, radical design when it came out and produced over 30 years, at one point Parker said that they made a million a year of the 51 and it is still highly sought after by collectors and users, one of the few pens that is inflation proof.

A few years ago you could have paid £20 a pen, the average price is now £50-70 but I have seen rare versions sell for £400+, there is even one in the Maritime museum, a gift from Eisenhower to Andrew Cunningham

image.jpeg



The new version of the 51 is just a regular Chinese copy of the 51 with Parker badging and an inflated price. Buy a good old 51 and you will not regret it.
 
There are one or two reasonable reviews for the "new" 51, but only for the gold nib version. The steel nibs aren't rated very highly, if at all. As remarked here, the price of them seems high, when originals in first-class condition are available from reputable sellers and pen specialists.

I've got an Aerometric, Lustralloy cap and 14k gold nib, which has seen its fair share of service, but still writes well. They are very well-designed and made pens, and my only reservation about the 51, and the same for the 61, is that, personally and as a "fan" of wet pens, I'd like them to run a bit wetter, to suit my style.

When I was a boy, the default fountain pen to take to boarding school was a Platignum but, having mastered Marion Richardson etc. and developed your own hand, the progression was often to a 51, which never failed to arouse some envy in those who didn't have one. The nib design of the 51 was well-suited to protect it, when in the hands of schoolboys.

Anyway, @matteob , may you produce many miles of handwriting with your acquisition.
 
Ferrum said:
There are one or two reasonable reviews for the "new" 51, but only for the gold nib version. The steel nibs aren't rated very highly, if at all. As remarked here, the price of them seems high, when originals in first-class condition are available from reputable sellers and pen specialists.

I've got an Aerometric, Lustralloy cap and 14k gold nib, which has seen its fair share of service, but still writes well. They are very well-designed and made pens, and my only reservation about the 51, and the same for the 61, is that, personally and as a "fan" of wet pens, I'd like them to run a bit wetter, to suit my style.

When I was a boy, the default fountain pen to take to boarding school was a Platignum but, having mastered Marion Richardson etc. and developed your own hand, the progression was often to a 51, which never failed to arouse some envy in those who didn't have one. The nib design of the 51 was well-suited to protect it, when in the hands of schoolboys.

Anyway, @matteob , may you produce many miles of handwriting with your acquisition.
Click to expand...

You might find that the flow can be improved with a good flush, an overnight soak or even using an ultra sonic cleaner, a wetter ink is good too.
 
De 2 said:
You might find that the flow can be improved with a good flush, an overnight soak or even using an ultra sonic cleaner, a wetter ink is good too.
Click to expand...
I've tried all of those approaches, and also adding a drop of Liquitex to the fill, and although they make for an improvement, it's still a tad dry for me. I should add that this isn't an aspect of my 51 alone, but happens with some other pens, such as Cleo Skribent, and is more of a fad of mine than a real bar to using those pens.
 
Ferrum said:
I've tried all of those approaches, and also adding a drop of Liquitex to the fill, and although they make for an improvement, it's still a tad dry for me. I should add that this isn't an aspect of my 51 alone, but happens with some other pens, such as Cleo Skribent, and is more of a fad of mine than a real bar to using those pens
Click to expand...

There is an expert in Bury St Edmunds, I won't say his name on here but send me a private message if you would like his name, it may be just a case of setting up the collector to the nib to suit you better.

Thinking about this, it is possible that whilst we seek wetness, line variation and shading from our pens it is possible that Parker designed the pen to simplake a consistent writing pen that didn't leak and allowed the ink to dry quickly on the page in order to prevent smudging, even producing Superchrome ink for the 51 to that aim.

If you would like to try a wet writing ink one of my favourite inks is sold by Pure Pens and is Cwm Idwal, a rich green in the shade of the recent racing Bentley.
 
T
De 2 said:
There is an expert in Bury St Edmunds, I won't say his name on here but send me a private message if you would like his name, it may be just a case of setting up the collector to the nib to suit you better.

Thinking about this, it is possible that whilst we seek wetness, line variation and shading from our pens it is possible that Parker designed the pen to simplake a consistent writing pen that didn't leak and allowed the ink to dry quickly on the page in order to prevent smudging, even producing Superchrome ink for the 51 to that aim.

If you would like to try a wet writing ink one of my favourite inks is sold by Pure Pens and is Cwm Idwal, a rich green in the shade of the recent racing Bentley.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the information. I think I know who you are speaking of in Bury.

You are undoubtedly correct in your comments about the Parker design. Of itself, it represents a definite move away from the type of pens then common up till then (of which I have several, like Mentmore, Mabie Todd etc.) in nib design, and also in the way that it lays down ink. I may be mixing it up with something else, but I seem to recall some attention was made to pens that didn't leak during air travel, which was then becoming more common.

My wettest inks at present are Pilot, Sailor, some of the Noodlers, and a couple of the Dominant Industry offerings. I did have some samples of the Pure Pens ink a few years ago, one of which was Llanberis Slate, but didn't get any more. I started my working life at the Leo Burnett-LPE advertising agency in London, and, at the time the eponymous founder was still alive, although he died a few months after I joined. His "trademark" was to sign and write in green ink, and the staff were more than frowned upon if any were to use green ink for anything. I'll use any colour under the sun, bar green and those shimmer things that block your pen; perhaps a case of "old habits die hard". However, a number of the Pure Pens inks look as if they shade and vary nicely, and I'll be deciding on which today.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom