Leaky Preppy

[Cami]

I bought a converter for a new, medium nib Preppy and filled it with J Herbin ink. It was the first time I’ve ever done this and everything seemed to go perfectly, except that it’s pretty leaky. Help me troubleshoot, please!

[gbryal]

The type of converter I have in my preppy has a metal sleeve on the part surrounding the twisty bit. That sleeve can be loosened. That is one place to check, make sure that is tight. Also make sure the converter is well-seated in the pen. If the leak is inside the pen and not coming from the nib/feed, it's probably the converter.

If everything is snug, it might just be a bad converter. It's an unfortunate fact of life that a lot of converters fail or are bad out of the box, and it's best to get a new one and throw the old one away. It's unfortunate that in this case the converter costs more than the pen.

You can convert this pen to be eyedropper filled also, so you can also check if the leak is at the feed by filling the whole thing with water, I suppose.

[grainweevil]

I'd definitely check the converter's well-seated first; easiest thing to do and likeliest trouble. Also make sure your nib is firmly in the section. The Preppy nib lives on a feed-onna-stick, and that can sometimes be unintentionally pulled out a little. If you think the converter is the culprit, it's readily disassembled and some silicone grease on the plunger and the threads at the top may be all you need to solve the problem. I've saved many a "bad" converter this way, and only wish I lived closer to gbryal so I could raid his trash. It might be worth noting that there is some disagreement over whether the Preppy takes the converter at all; Cult Pens, for instance, is adamant that it won't. Must admit that, despite having several Preppys and Plaisirs, I've never actually used anything but refilled cartridges in them. Or eyedroppered, in the case of the Preppys.

[ambimom]

Excuse me for this question, but why buy a converter for a $3 pen? The converter cost more than the pen. Maybe invest in let's say a Platinum Plaisir for $12. The converter will surely not leak. [I own a Platinum Plaisir with a converter.]

[Cami]

Ok, thanks for the tips, i checked to make sure the nib and converter were properly seated. I think the problem was maybe that the feed was just oversaturated after filling. Now that i’ve been using it for a few days the feed looks much cleaner. I think in the future i’ll just fill the converter separetely with a dropper instead of sucking ink up through the feed.

[dfo]

Excuse me for this question, but why buy a converter for a $3 pen? The converter cost more than the pen. Maybe invest in let's say a Platinum Plaisir for $12. The converter will surely not leak. [I own a Platinum Plaisir with a converter.]

To use ink from a bottle. The plaisir and preppy use the same nib and feed. Why does it matter about the cost?