The life of a pen ..and a car

Frank, I think there may have been a miscommunique.
Not the part about you being the group's pen repair expert - I mean, you
wrote da book plus I recall you saying you repair something like 1000+
pens a month. I mean the part about using ink colors. I get the
impression that you think that people who put different colors in their
pens write 3 words, flush the pen out, and fill with another color as
the whim hits them.
If you do fill and empty your pen 20 times a week with flushes added...
Maybe some people do that - nobody I know.

The people I know (myself included) all fill 'er up with a color and use
the pen till it goes bone dry, then some people might flush the pen, but
I usually put in a similar color and watch the ink color change over as
it flows from the pen. (i.e. fill with green till used up, then fill
with blue, then purple, then plum, back to blue, etc). It's kind of fun
watching the ink change colors as you write, and that way I don't have
to bother flushing the pen so I'm not overworking the lever mechanism.
For people who do constant flushings, your point is well taken that the
mechanism will need to be repaired sooner.

Back to the flushing, I don't know anyone who likes inks who writes a
few words and flushes the pen out. And worse yet, twenty times a week?
No way! I can't imagine anyone except Wilt Chamberlain or Charlie
Sheen who would dip his nib around wantonly like that! I hear Wilt
Chamberlain had 20,000 bottles of ink. ; )

Nancy

wrote:
Many times I have said on average a properly repaired pen will last an
average of about 20 or more years before needing another repair. Some
will go ten, others may go 50. Perhaps 25 years may be the best average.
However I base that on using the pen AS IT WAS DESIGNED TO BE USED.
Which, IMHO, means filling it with ink, and never removing the ink
except through normal writing when it is again filled once it is empty
or near so. Add a two to four water flushes a year. Thats it.

Yet time and time again I hear from people asking why their "poperly"
repaired pen breaks down in a few years or less. Often times within
even months. Do the math. Just as a car driven 100,000 miles a year
cannot last as long as one driven 10,000 assuming equal care is taken.
Every mechanical thing eventually breaks, wears, cracks, and so on.

The problem here is, if I am any sort of "authority" as Nancy said, (her
words, not mine) then I had better explain what I mean when I say a
properly repaired pen can last 20 years or more on average. Otherwise
some beginner may think they can fill that pen and flush the pen
multiple times every week or even every day for 20 years or more with
nary a problem. No way on earth!

No pen can stand up to that and no pen is designed for that. Anyone
using a pen like that is like drving 100,000 or more miles a year in a
car. Fine if you want to and if you like driving--go for it. Have fun.
Enjoy! But just as its fair to say the average car will last 10 or
more years, no way can a car driven 100,000 miles a year last as long
without some pretty major work en route. That 100,000 mile per year
car is not "average use." Nor will it have an average life span between
needed repairs like breaks, mufflers, tires and so on.

Same goes with pens. Just common sense. If you do fill and empty your
pen 20 times a week with flushes added don't exppect a properly repaired
pen to last anywhere near 20 years. Or even 10. Maybe not even 5.
Perhaps not even one in some cases like some Vacs or piston fillers.
Thats the way it goes. and it is, or should be common sense. Frank

Nancy Handy wrote:

Frank, I think there may have been a miscommunique.

It seems so in the way you say you may use your pens.

.. I get the
impression that you think that people who put different colors in their
pens write 3 words, flush the pen out, and fill with another color as
the whim hits them.
If you do fill and empty your pen 20 times a week with flushes added...
Maybe some people do that - nobody I know.

I really think some people may do just that. OK, not you. Explanation
accepted. But anyone who may even think they the can do that had best
know its long term effect of a pens life.

For people who do constant flushings, your point is well taken that the
mechanism will need to be repaired sooner.

Thanks and how many times have I and other warned about possible
problems of overcleaning? Again--not directed at you, but others who
may do so. How many posts have we seen about how to take apart pens to
make them all but surgically clean?

Back to the flushing, I don't know anyone who likes inks who writes a
few words and flushes the pen out. And worse yet, twenty times a week?
No way! I can't imagine anyone except Wilt Chamberlain or Charlie
Sheen who would dip his nib around wantonly like that! I hear Wilt
Chamberlain had 20,000 bottles of ink. ; )

Bill Clinton?

Frank

What do you suggest we do if we have a number of pens and enjoy using
them. When we switch to a different pen, are we better leaving the ink
in the prior pen even though we may not use it again for a month or two
or should we empty the ink back into the bottle and flush the pen with
water?

wrote:
Nancy Handy wrote:

Frank, I think there may have been a miscommunique.


It seems so in the way you say you may use your pens.

. I get the

impression that you think that people who put different colors in their
pens write 3 words, flush the pen out, and fill with another color as
the whim hits them.

If you do fill and empty your pen 20 times a week with flushes added...

Maybe some people do that - nobody I know.


I really think some people may do just that. OK, not you. Explanation
accepted. But anyone who may even think they the can do that had best
know its long term effect of a pens life.


For people who do constant flushings, your point is well taken that the
mechanism will need to be repaired sooner.


Thanks and how many times have I and other warned about possible
problems of overcleaning? Again--not directed at you, but others who
may do so. How many posts have we seen about how to take apart pens to
make them all but surgically clean?


Back to the flushing, I don't know anyone who likes inks who writes a
few words and flushes the pen out. And worse yet, twenty times a week?
No way! I can't imagine anyone except Wilt Chamberlain or Charlie
Sheen who would dip his nib around wantonly like that! I hear Wilt
Chamberlain had 20,000 bottles of ink. ; )


Bill Clinton?

Frank

"Nancy Handy" wrote in message
...
Frank, I think there may have been a miscommunique.
Not the part about you being the group's pen repair expert - I mean, you
wrote da book plus I recall you saying you repair something like 1000+
pens a month. I mean the part about using ink colors. I get the
impression that you think that people who put different colors in their
pens write 3 words, flush the pen out, and fill with another color as
the whim hits them.
If you do fill and empty your pen 20 times a week with flushes added...
Maybe some people do that - nobody I know.

The people I know (myself included) all fill 'er up with a color and use
the pen till it goes bone dry, then some people might flush the pen, but
I usually put in a similar color and watch the ink color change over as
it flows from the pen. (i.e. fill with green till used up, then fill
with blue, then purple, then plum, back to blue, etc). It's kind of fun
watching the ink change colors as you write, and that way I don't have
to bother flushing the pen so I'm not overworking the lever mechanism.
For people who do constant flushings, your point is well taken that the
mechanism will need to be repaired sooner.

Back to the flushing, I don't know anyone who likes inks who writes a
few words and flushes the pen out. And worse yet, twenty times a week?
No way! I can't imagine anyone except Wilt Chamberlain or Charlie
Sheen who would dip his nib around wantonly like that! I hear Wilt
Chamberlain had 20,000 bottles of ink. ; )

I could use some more bottles of ink ...


Nancy


So the main stress points should be the screws, piston seals, and nuts of
piston-fill mechanisms, and fatigue of spring bars and the latex sac in
lever fillers. Except for the risks of added handling, the rest of the pen
should not be affected by this heavy use.

In article , Barry
writes:

What do you suggest we do if we have a number of pens and enjoy using
them. When we switch to a different pen, are we better leaving the ink
in the prior pen even though we may not use it again for a month or two
or should we empty the ink back into the bottle and flush the pen with
water?

If you know with certainty the pen will be used again within two months there
is no reason for flushing... but regardless, I wouldn't recommend expelling ink
that's been in a pen for more than a week or from a pen that has been refilled
numerous times over many weeks without flushing back into the bottle... ink is
cheap, expel old ink down the drain. Of course if you're an obsessively cheap
******* who can't bear to waste even a drop of ink then use an old empty bottle
to collect all the dregs rather than contaminate fresh ink. I have an inkwell
I use to collect dregs, makes a wonderfully intense font for dip pens.


---= BOYCOTT FRENCH--GERMAN (belgium) =---
---= Move UNITED NATIONS To Paris =---
Sheldon
````````````
"Life would be devoid of all meaning were it without tribulation."

Point well made, which simply put, is that the more you use a pen
(fill/use/clean/fill cycle) the more wear you put on the pen, and the higher
likelyhood that it will need repair earlier in it's life (not to mention
simply using it to write will cause wear, and increase the likelyhood of an
accident.....)

However, how much you care depends on who you are and what you do with your
pen. If you collect to collect, then you may not use most of your pens much
if at all.

If, like me, you collect to use, then it's the 'using' part that is more
important. If my vintage pen(s) doesn't last as long as they could because I
am using it a lot (including changing to a different ink - and flushing it
out - every time I fill it) then It doesn't matter, because my purpose is to
enjoy using it (and the different inks), not preserve it, and I accept that
my pen is an 'expense', not an 'investment'.

Michel.

wrote in message ...

Many times I have said on average a properly repaired pen will last an
average of about 20 or more years before needing another repair. Some
will go ten, others may go 50. Perhaps 25 years may be the best average.
However I base that on using the pen AS IT WAS DESIGNED TO BE USED.
Which, IMHO, means filling it with ink, and never removing the ink
except through normal writing when it is again filled once it is empty
or near so. Add a two to four water flushes a year. Thats it.

Yet time and time again I hear from people asking why their "poperly"
repaired pen breaks down in a few years or less. Often times within
even months. Do the math. Just as a car driven 100,000 miles a year
cannot last as long as one driven 10,000 assuming equal care is taken.
Every mechanical thing eventually breaks, wears, cracks, and so on.

The problem here is, if I am any sort of "authority" as Nancy said, (her
words, not mine) then I had better explain what I mean when I say a
properly repaired pen can last 20 years or more on average. Otherwise
some beginner may think they can fill that pen and flush the pen
multiple times every week or even every day for 20 years or more with
nary a problem. No way on earth!

No pen can stand up to that and no pen is designed for that. Anyone
using a pen like that is like drving 100,000 or more miles a year in a
car. Fine if you want to and if you like driving--go for it. Have fun.
Enjoy! But just as its fair to say the average car will last 10 or
more years, no way can a car driven 100,000 miles a year last as long
without some pretty major work en route. That 100,000 mile per year
car is not "average use." Nor will it have an average life span between
needed repairs like breaks, mufflers, tires and so on.

Same goes with pens. Just common sense. If you do fill and empty your
pen 20 times a week with flushes added don't exppect a properly repaired
pen to last anywhere near 20 years. Or even 10. Maybe not even 5.
Perhaps not even one in some cases like some Vacs or piston fillers.
Thats the way it goes. and it is, or should be common sense. Frank

wrote:
If you do fill and empty your pen 20 times a week with flushes added...
Maybe some people do that - nobody I know.

I really think some people may do just that. OK, not you. Explanation
accepted. But anyone who may even think they the can do that had best
know its long term effect of a pens life.

The only people, who I imagine would flush pens constantly, would be
newbies and some people who use modern pens that have converters because
converters are cheap and replaceable. I hope nobody else does!

Thanks and how many times have I and other warned about possible
problems of overcleaning? Again--not directed at you, but others who
may do so. How many posts have we seen about how to take apart pens to
make them all but surgically clean?

I'd like to hire one of those people to clean my house. You just know
they'd do the best job in the bathrooms.

I can't imagine anyone except Wilt Chamberlain or Charlie
Sheen who would dip his nib around wantonly like that! I hear Wilt
Chamberlain had 20,000 bottles of ink. ; )

Bill Clinton?

ROFLOL
Clinton and his Montegrappa Cigar LE.

Nancy

(Juan) wrote in message . com...
"MJT" wrote in message ...
Point well made, which simply put, is that the more you use a pen
(fill/use/clean/fill cycle) the more wear you put on the pen, and the higher
likelyhood that it will need repair earlier in it's life (not to mention
simply using it to write will cause wear, and increase the likelyhood of an
accident.....)

However, how much you care depends on who you are and what you do with your
pen. If you collect to collect, then you may not use most of your pens much
if at all.

If, like me, you collect to use, then it's the 'using' part that is more
important. If my vintage pen(s) doesn't last as long as they could because I
am using it a lot (including changing to a different ink - and flushing it
out - every time I fill it) then It doesn't matter, because my purpose is to
enjoy using it (and the different inks), not preserve it, and I accept that
my pen is an 'expense', not an 'investment'.

Michel.

I agree. But I'm sure that Frank didn't mean that you have to wait to
run out of ink to refill the pen. Sure, maybe the pen will need a new
sac in say.... 20 years, instead of 22 years... so what?. It's the
obsession of using all your pens in one day or trying every new ink in
the market that leads to situations like the ones Frank talked about.
Pens are meant to be used, but some people think that they'r using
their pens simply by filling them, writing a few words and flushing.
It's like they'r forcing themselves to "use" something simply because
it cost a lot of money or something.
In any case, I think that most people in this group do not fall into
that category.

Juan

wrote in message ...

Many times I have said on average a properly repaired pen will last an
average of about 20 or more years before needing another repair. Some
will go ten, others may go 50. Perhaps 25 years may be the best average.
However I base that on using the pen AS IT WAS DESIGNED TO BE USED.
Which, IMHO, means filling it with ink, and never removing the ink
except through normal writing when it is again filled once it is empty
or near so. Add a two to four water flushes a year. Thats it.

Yet time and time again I hear from people asking why their "poperly"
repaired pen breaks down in a few years or less. Often times within
even months. Do the math. Just as a car driven 100,000 miles a year
cannot last as long as one driven 10,000 assuming equal care is taken.
Every mechanical thing eventually breaks, wears, cracks, and so on.

The problem here is, if I am any sort of "authority" as Nancy said, (her
words, not mine) then I had better explain what I mean when I say a
properly repaired pen can last 20 years or more on average. Otherwise
some beginner may think they can fill that pen and flush the pen
multiple times every week or even every day for 20 years or more with
nary a problem. No way on earth!

No pen can stand up to that and no pen is designed for that. Anyone
using a pen like that is like drving 100,000 or more miles a year in a
car. Fine if you want to and if you like driving--go for it. Have fun.
Enjoy! But just as its fair to say the average car will last 10 or
more years, no way can a car driven 100,000 miles a year last as long
without some pretty major work en route. That 100,000 mile per year
car is not "average use." Nor will it have an average life span between
needed repairs like breaks, mufflers, tires and so on.

Same goes with pens. Just common sense. If you do fill and empty your
pen 20 times a week with flushes added don't exppect a properly repaired
pen to last anywhere near 20 years. Or even 10. Maybe not even 5.
Perhaps not even one in some cases like some Vacs or piston fillers.
Thats the way it goes. and it is, or should be common sense. Frank

A fairly simple answer to this dialogue is that when you purchase a
new car, you get lower operating expenses until the car is paid off
which would be around 4 years or so, then the expenses start climbing
when major components of the car start breaking down. By the time the
car is 8 or 9 years old, many of the original parts have been replaced
or repaired. The same is for a pen, you get many years of pleasure in
the first few years, and then the sac has to be replaced or clog has
to be removed from the filler.

For pens, it depends on how the user takes care of the pen. If the
pen is abused, it will not last a long time. A NFL linebacker or a
wrestler will not take good care of a delicate fountain pen. Ditto
for cars and you can see how police treat their cars - they abuse them
all the time until it breaks down after too many high speed car chases
and then they abuse the replacement as well!

Jim

"James Goodwin" wrote in part:

| For pens, it depends on how the user takes care of the pen. If the
| pen is abused, it will not last a long time. A NFL linebacker or a
| wrestler will not take good care of a delicate fountain pen.

Unfair generalization. How do you know this?

! Ditto
| for cars and you can see how police treat their cars - they abuse
them
| all the time until it breaks down after too many high speed car
chases
| and then they abuse the replacement as well!

Again, an unfair characterization. All NFL players are not the same.
Nor all police.

john cline ii who felt that needed saying