Suddenly Dry

[markt]

I posted this on FPN as well.

I don't consider myself a newbie, but this one has me stumped. I received a new Edison pen last week (SS nib, fine). Out of the box, filled it with Waterman Blue-Black. It wrote with a wonderfully wet line, a little broader than normal fine, but well to my liking and minimal feedback. Last night I refilled with the same ink, same bottle and it is noticeably drier with a much thinner line than before and scratchy, on same paper. I thought maybe something was clogging the feed channel. I removed the filler and flushed the nib with a bulb cleaner thoroughly and dried it, replaced the filler and it is still writing the thinner line with noticeable more feedback than originally. I'm at a loss. Any suggestions? I have never had a pen exhibit such a change after a simple refill. And no, I did not do anything to the nib between refills.

[bgray]

If you can't get a diagnosis, feel free to reach out to me. I'll be happy to see what we can do with it.

[manoeuver]

didja loupe it up? Sounds to me like yo tines got splanked.

[KrazyIvan]

Yup, sounds like the nibbage is out of alignment.

[markt]

Tines look fine. I think it may have been smoother when the flow was wetter.

[manoeuver]

If I was there I'd jam it into my eye and tell you how smooth it was.

Kinda glad I'm here instead.

[markt]

Interesting technique. I think I will take a pass trying that on myself. Really the scratchiness is only minor. It was just "real" smooth initially. It's just not laying down as much ink.

[KrazyIvan]

Waterman Blue Black is pretty free flowing. What about paper residue between the tines?

[fountainpenkid]

no ideas on how this happened, but you could scribble with it (moderate pressure, quick strokes) for a couple minutes and see what happens.

[markt]

Just a followup for all. My plan was to get Brian from Edison to look at it at the Dallas Pen Show, but he did not attend. I was only able to be at the show for one and half hours so I could not get high in the queue to get a nibmeister to look at the Edison nib. I was having Danny Fudge fix two of my Parker 51s. By time I was through with him, there was already a line with Pendleton Brown and John Mottishaw.

I did talk with Brian from Anderson Pens who was at the show and he looked at how my Collier wrote and he confirmed with what I finally came to the conclusion of...that the fine nib was performing as a fine nib should. He was courteous enough to let me use his medium Edison and it wrote pretty close to what I am looking for. So, I just purchased another nib and now have both a fine and a medium.

Now for the rest of the story. When I first switched out nibs on the Collier (medium for fine), the line of the medium was really wide, almost to the point of a broad. I removed the section and flushed this new nib and after drying, it performs as a medium, just a tad wider than I prefer but pretty darn close. The medium nib is much smoother than the fine, plenty wet. I would have to say that there must be something from the factory on these nibs that make them perform like this. It may not be the case with all, but it happened with me with two different sized nibs from two different vendors.

I'm still a happy Edison owner. If I can get more time at the next pen show and get in line earlier, I may get the medium adjusted slightly to a finer line or possibly a stub.