Page 3 of 3 FirstFirst 123
Results 41 to 48 of 48

Thread: A second attempt

  1. #41
    Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    37
    Thanks
    5
    Thanked 63 Times in 23 Posts
    Rep Power
    0

    Default Re: A second attempt

    Quote Originally Posted by Shuli View Post
    I love it. Super helpful considering I'd like to make a pen myself. Where did you source the acrylic and piston?
    Thank you!

    The acrylic is 20mm rod from kuststofshp.nl, they sell in 1 meter lengths. The piston is turned out of that same rod. The feeds and the 'flex' nibs come from FPR, fountainpenrevolution, the medium nibs are from the JinHao brand, I got them from eBay. A lot cheaper than the Indian ones!. FPR offers feeds in different sizes, and different cuts : the ones I got are cut generously, for flex nibs. It works quite well with a Brause Rose nib, I had great fun relearning my school script. But the back end of the Brause Rose nib, the bit that is between the feed and the section, starts rusting away as soon as it is in contact with ink, which, in a fountain pen, is always. I didn't get to use a quarter of the reservoir before I had to change out the nib, I could see rust accumulating in the section. The other two nibs, the FPR #35 flex and the JinHao #6 medium, write beautifully; I suspect the generous feed makes them feel more luxurious than they really are : they glide on a little cushion of ink.

    I made the first pistons in one piece, but that made them very hard to turn without accidents : the outside has to be machined first, leaving very little material to bore into, making it almost impossible not to overheat. Now I make the bore in the full rod, then turn it to size, with the lip for the o-ring near the chuck. The knob is a separate piece, built as a stopper, which is then glued into the piston with cyanoacrylate superglue. Leaves an invisible join.

    Hope that helps!

  2. #42
    Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    37
    Thanks
    5
    Thanked 63 Times in 23 Posts
    Rep Power
    0

    Default Re: A second attempt

    Three months later.

    I've been trying to fashion my piston pen out of pleasingly couloured acrylic blanks, with catastrophic results. To ensure a good fit, I heat shrink the section on the nib and feed. But at 90 - 80° C, the material is malleable. As I had the piston engaged, to facilitate the insertion of the tube stuck in the feed, the o-ring deformed the reservoir, making it leaky. Two pens went that way, one just got unstuck. Aargh!.

    Now, I build the insides of the pen first. Like this :



    Then, I bore out the section just under size. I bore out the feed, glue in the tube, and put the nib and feed in the fridge. The section, without the piston, goes into freshly boiled water for a few minutes. I then fit everything together and put some pressure on the assembly in a collet chuck. The hot plastic shrinks on the nib and feed, and leaves only very small gaps, while leaving a straight bore behind it. The last operation is to turn down the tapers. Some dust gets in the nib & feed, but that is easily washed out. It works quite well :



    A happy side effect of the springiness of the material is that the tapers, though cut on exactly the same angle on the compound, are slightly out : the outside cone is a little too narrow, and the inside taper a tad too wide. The result is that the cap fits on a little ring near the end of the section, ensuring secure closing and easy opening. The difference is very slight : the cap doesn't wiggle. And if the tapers were perfectly aligned, it would be very hard to get the cap off.

    The Piston pen needs a window; it is generous, not leaky, but, like an eye-dropper, when the back half of the pen is filled with air, the heat of the hand can be enough to make the air push some of the ink out. so it is good practice, to push out the air bubble when it gets too big. The pen needs a window. And the clear acrylic is stiffer than the coloured. So i made this :



    It's far from perfect, but it works. The barrel is one piece of clear plastic, the coloured stuff a sleeve glued around the barrel, and the section glued into a chamber cut in the front of the transparent acrylic. There is some unevenness in the glueing, mostly around the section. And the outside of the barrel is slightly out of whack : where it feathers into the mosaic pattern you can see the angle.
    But it is the best writing pen I have made yet. Very wet, but not leaky. Very very smooth. And if you don't look too closely, it looks rather nice, I think.

    Cheers!

  3. The Following User Says Thank You to lukitas For This Useful Post:

    NibsForScript (September 30th, 2018)

  4. #43
    Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    37
    Thanks
    5
    Thanked 63 Times in 23 Posts
    Rep Power
    0

    Default Re: A second attempt

    I'm well chuffed. It feels like a miracle.

    I discovered the perfect fit for a flex nib, ebonite feed and acrylic section. The feed has to be as far forward as feasible, and then a bit more. It has to be heat shaped to the nib over it's whole length. The section bore has to be a tad undersize, enough to permit the nib and feed to just slip in when the section is hot. The best possible fit. The ebonite pushes little ridges under the nib, and the section shrinks on the assembly.

    I've been trying to fit Brause Roses and Zebra G's to fountain pens for a while, with sorry results. Until now.



    Shiny, wet ink. No drips, no drops, no dribbles, but all the ink you need, on demand. Pages and pages.



    When the piston has about a little finger's with of air at the top of the section, it will start to gush a little. The solution is simple. Push the air out, holding the pen upright. With a hankie around the section, of course. Big reservoir : the air that seeps back in the pen has loads of ink to push on, best keep it to a minimum.

    More Pen-Porn :



    I love this pen. Haven't had any false starts yet, nor railroads. It's wonderful.

    Cheers

  5. The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to lukitas For This Useful Post:

    da vinci (August 16th, 2018), manoeuver (April 4th, 2017), mrcharlie (April 4th, 2017), rpsyed (October 22nd, 2017)

  6. #44
    Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    37
    Thanks
    5
    Thanked 63 Times in 23 Posts
    Rep Power
    0

    Default Re: A second attempt

    It has been a wild ride.
    It has been nearly a year. Of disappointment, breakages, accidents and bloody stupidity. But now I make pens that work exactly how I like them : near the limit of giving too much ink. Without leaking. I made a zebra G pen that can trace three millimetre think lines without hesitation. A stub that writes so fat it requires especially feather-proof paper. All of them write the moment you put the point to the paper, even after several weeks of non-use.
    There are niggles. It is hard to excruciatingly difficult to ensure straight bores, and the problems grow exponentially with smaller bores. A cutting tool with a 5mm diameter shaft, 50 mm long, cannot be but bendy. If only slightly. And the acrylic itself bends every which way. Every one of my bores has some deformation. The barrels are as straight and slick as I can make them, but they are always a tad wider at the bottom. Which can make it a little difficult to actuate the piston. My finishes aren't as good as I would like them to be, especially not in the insides.

    To round off this story, I would like to present a pen, that was commissioned by a lover of purple, I filled it with Noodler's Saguaro Wine :



    It is fitted with a Jin Hao Medium nr.6, which feels and looks like a luxurious bold, given the generous amount of ink on which it floats.

    And I triumphantly announce my first sale of a pen, for a decent price (calculated at about 40 to 50 hours of work) :



    A fine - ish semi-flex nr. 6 from FPR. I wrote the accompanying letter with it. And you may have noticed I felt confident enough to send it out filled. I tested it. I didn't leak after two days of standing on its point. And after three weeks of leaving the cap on, it writes the moment it touches paper. It will be a present for someone who likes to put ink on paper.

    I guess this must be the end of this series of posts. The second attempt has become a useable series of pens. Thank you all for enduring my fumbling.

    Lukas

  7. The Following 3 Users Say Thank You to lukitas For This Useful Post:

    da vinci (August 16th, 2018), fountainpagan (September 30th, 2018), rpsyed (October 22nd, 2017)

  8. #45
    Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    37
    Thanks
    5
    Thanked 63 Times in 23 Posts
    Rep Power
    0

    Default Re: A second attempt

    One last remark.
    When I was a boy, my dad taught me to hold my pen as high as I could, keeping my fingers away from the nib as far as possible.
    I never reflected on why that was better, until I saw my sister using one of my pens, and remarking on that teaching of my dad"s.
    When you put a pen on paper, the area in which it can move is determined by the center of the three finger grip you have on the pen.
    The higher one places that grip, the bigger the area that can be covered. It requires less movement for a conveniently sized letter, causes less fatigue, allows for more precise control, and wider embellishments.
    Freedom of finger placement is one of the most important design features of my Piston pen : the absence of design features along the length of the pen make it so.
    Last edited by lukitas; July 22nd, 2017 at 08:07 PM.

  9. The Following User Says Thank You to lukitas For This Useful Post:

    SIR (August 16th, 2018)

  10. #46
    Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    37
    Thanks
    5
    Thanked 63 Times in 23 Posts
    Rep Power
    0

    Default Re: A second attempt

    Woohoo!
    One of my pens was reviewed by Stephen Brown of Youtube fame :

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17fB8sXKLpg

    Have a look!

  11. The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to lukitas For This Useful Post:

    azkid (October 1st, 2018), calamus (August 16th, 2018)

  12. #47
    Senior Member calamus's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2018
    Location
    Redwoods Rainforest
    Posts
    1,330
    Thanks
    1,155
    Thanked 1,386 Times in 587 Posts
    Rep Power
    8

    Default Re: A second attempt

    Congratulations!

    Good job.
    Quid rides? Mutato nomine de te fabula narratur. — Horace
    (What are you laughing at? Just change the name and the joke’s on you.)

  13. #48
    Senior Member NibsForScript's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2017
    Location
    The beautiful coast of Maine
    Posts
    181
    Thanks
    580
    Thanked 133 Times in 67 Posts
    Rep Power
    7

    Default Re: A second attempt

    Great work. Keep at it!

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •