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#1
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Ruined Nib?!
I think I've ruined the nib on my newest pen. A while back I posted about it
being scratchy, ect... and tried to fix the problem myself rather than take it to a repairman. I tried to polish the nib on a penny and have made it incredibly worse, now it's scratchy and it skips! I guess I shouldn't even ask, but is there a right way to polish on the penny? I should have known better than try myself! Thanks -- H-S-F Cut your hair to respond. |
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#2
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Ruined Nib?!
help-slip-franklin wrote
I think I've ruined the nib on my newest pen. A while back I posted about it being scratchy, ect... and tried to fix the problem myself rather than take it to a repairman. I tried to polish the nib on a penny and have made it incredibly worse, now it's scratchy and it skips! I guess I shouldn't even ask, but is there a right way to polish on the penny? I should have known better than try myself! Thanks There are great ways to smoothen a nib, but none of those involve a penny. I'd never heard anyone espouse this "copper penny method" before I read a post here by an anonymous poster describing it (and, incidentally, also recommending the use of nail clippers to align tines! .... a job better entrusted to one's fingers ... easier and less likely to leave ugly marks in soft metal). The copper penny method of nib smoothing may be making its rounds to other newsgroups/listservs/boards but, AFAIK, the method can be traced to a single source. Old pen repair manuals don't mention it. Frank Dubiel never espoused it. None of the dozen or so pen repair people I know personally or those who post to the various forums use such a method. However, these observations don't help you... Sooooo.... If you want to do it yourself, start with the following instructions by John Mottishaw: http://www.nibs.com/Article6SmoothingAdjusting.htm Most people in the business use some variation of this approach. Although smoothing your own nibs can be very satisfying, one can easily ruin a nib trying to smoothen it. Mylar disks (aka: lapping film) will take iridium down in no time flat (sorry the pun) if you're not careful. Also, many novices end up creating a smooth flat spot that works for them and the way they hold the pen but for no one else. This isn't a problem as long as they keep the pen, but if they sell it or pass it along to someone else, the next user may find the nib draggy or scratchy. Learning how to smoothen a nib takes experience. Start with good, solid information (such as that found on John Mottishaw's site) and then experiment with inexpensive, replaceable nibs. Learn how to spot misaligned tines and align them before you start sanding away. Smoothing is a destructive method in that it removes material from the nib's tip. Once removed that material can't be put back (unless you have the nib retipped, and that's very expensive). Sorry about your nib. If it's a valuable one, have a pro do it. If it's something you don't mind sacrificing to your education, try the instructions on John's site. -- Take care, B |
#3
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Ruined Nib?!
"help-slip-franklin" wrote in message news:4lAmg.6$Yk.2@trnddc06... ...I tried to polish the nib on a penny and have made it incredibly worse, now it's scratchy and it skips! I guess I shouldn't even ask, but is there a right way to polish on the penny?... There's a description of the technique in a January post by "Virgiliopoeta". I do this myself, and it works great for me, but: A) That's just me, playing with my own pens. I'm not a nib technician and can't make any sort of "professional" recommendation. B) It's a relatively subtle method for smoothing a mostly-OK point (it does seem to be a good way to debur a flossed slit). If the nib is _really_ scratchy, you may have to align the tines, and/or resort to sanding (e.g. on mylar); C) If you're not careful, you could "hook" the pellet at the split on one of those Lincoln Memorial columns and pull that tine out of alignment. You have to be gentle -- don't press down so that the tines spread, don't push the tip into the columns -- and just feel how the tip is riding over the copper. Check the point on paper periodically: if it feels better, stop. More penny-rubbing will just start grinding down the pellet. Also, I don't simply hold the pen at my preferred writing angle -- to keep the pellet rounded, I roll the pen as I go. Brian -- |
#4
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Ruined Nib?!
help-slip-franklin a écrit : I think I've ruined the nib on my newest pen. A while back I posted aboutit being scratchy, ect... and tried to fix the problem myself rather than take it to a repairman. I tried to polish the nib on a penny and have made it incredibly worse, now it's scratchy and it skips! I guess I shouldn't even ask, but is there a right way to polish on the penny? I should have known better than try myself! Thanks -- H-S-F Cut your hair to respond. Well, I, virgiliopoeta, the horse's mouth, am indeed the only known source for this method. I always take care to remind beginners to use a junk nib ONLY until they have a lot of experience using this or any other nib-smoothing method. You may very well 'ruin' several nibs before you get the hang of it. However... it is actually pretty difficult to permanently ruin a nib, short of breaking one of the tines, or severely splaying them. Even the latter problem is usually fixable. I repeat, a beginner should always consult a good repairman when a valued pen is at stake. Polishing with mylar, while quite effective, is much MORE likely to ruin a nib if you're a beginner. Even pros sometimes ruin nibs with this method. You should ignore this BL fellow; he seems to have some sort of animus against me, heaven knows why. I never reply to such fellows, at least not directly - best of luck to him! Did you read all my posts on the copper-penny polishing method? They are quite explicit. Run the nib along the columns of the Lincoln memorial perpendicularly, using NO PRESSURE. You will have to practice for several hours at least before you are comfortable with polishing. There are many possible routines. If the pen now skips where it wrote well before, you probably splayed the tines slightly, or got them out of alignment. Use almost no pressure when polishing. Gently play around with the tines with some tweezers until you have the tines in alignment. See my posts on this. Try holding the nib slit up to the light. A good nib slit should let a fine but discernable sliver of light through. If you see no light, the pen will usually write too dry, if you see a wide line of light, the nib will either write too wet - or not at all, or will be hard-starting, or will skip. |
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