AJ DuneventAbout two years ago, I picked up a cheap #Fuliwen 015 #fountainpen in "Noble Golden" for the gimmicky fidget spinner cap. There was some sort of issue with the nib or feed because I could never get any ink out of it without furious tapping. The normal first line fixes (thorough cleaning, resetting the nib, flossing the tines, etc) didn't help at all. Since it was so cheap, I even experimented with trying to file the ink channel in the feed with the thinnest guitar nut file I could find. Still no luck. Since it was such a cheap pen, wasn't working, and had been irreversibly altered with questionable skill, I wasn't willing to sell it to offload it. I considered it garbage but I kept it all this time for some reason (novelty? goofiness?).
Then last month, I was putting in an order with #JetPens and decided to throw on a medium nib to replace the fine one on my Kaweco AC Sport. When my order came in, I went to swap the #Kaweco nibs and discovered that I had already, at some point, done so and had seemingly just forgotten to update my records. Oops.
An idea began to take shape. What if I took this new spare medium Kaweco nib I had and installed it on that old useless Fuliwen 015 I had somewhere? Maybe that would be the solution to the pen's dysfunctions. It wasn't a fit but, again, this was a cheap pen that I already considered trash... so I went to town with my rotary tool to widen the inside of the section. Eventually, I ground out enough material to get the Kaweco nib assembly to fit into the pen very tightly.
I installed a short cartridge I had lying around. The pen wrote great and kept writing and writing. It still wrote great the next day. I left it capped for five days and it still started up just fine. After thirteen additional days of non-use, it is still functioning great. I guess it has a pretty good seal despite its cheap, tacky appearance.
Anyway, that's my story about how I spent 2x the price of a pen on a new nib unit and "fixed" it. I now consider it a great little Frankenpen['s monster]. My only functional complaint is that it takes about four and a quarter turns to uncap it.
@[email protected] #fountainpens
Then last month, I was putting in an order with #JetPens and decided to throw on a medium nib to replace the fine one on my Kaweco AC Sport. When my order came in, I went to swap the #Kaweco nibs and discovered that I had already, at some point, done so and had seemingly just forgotten to update my records. Oops.
An idea began to take shape. What if I took this new spare medium Kaweco nib I had and installed it on that old useless Fuliwen 015 I had somewhere? Maybe that would be the solution to the pen's dysfunctions. It wasn't a fit but, again, this was a cheap pen that I already considered trash... so I went to town with my rotary tool to widen the inside of the section. Eventually, I ground out enough material to get the Kaweco nib assembly to fit into the pen very tightly.
I installed a short cartridge I had lying around. The pen wrote great and kept writing and writing. It still wrote great the next day. I left it capped for five days and it still started up just fine. After thirteen additional days of non-use, it is still functioning great. I guess it has a pretty good seal despite its cheap, tacky appearance.
Anyway, that's my story about how I spent 2x the price of a pen on a new nib unit and "fixed" it. I now consider it a great little Frankenpen['s monster]. My only functional complaint is that it takes about four and a quarter turns to uncap it.
@[email protected] #fountainpens
Garry Eves
