What's your latest restoration/repair story?

[penwash]

We have "What's your latest buy" thread, so I thought why not share your latest tinkering adventures.

Whether you're a pen restoration addict like me or if you have your pens restored by others, we probably have a story or two.

So let me kick it off:



I got this pen's barrel and cap long time ago as part of my bulk buys. I thought that the material looks very cool (hence I name it "Cracked Ice" - very original, I know). But it has not internal parts, no section, let alone nib. So it stayed in that special place on my workbench called "parts box".

Fast forward to this week. I held in my hand a jade green Hiriter barrel that has a crack the size of the Grand Canyon, relative to the size of the barrel, that is. So I ended up rescuing the internal parts, the section and the feed. Now here's the fun part, who knows that the internal parts *and* the section fits perfectly on the Cracked Ice barrel above.

It is this kind of discovery that keeps me in vintage pen restoration. It doesn't happen nearly often enough, but when it did happen, I am a happy camper.

So here it is, a no-brand name, not small (5-1/4 inches capped) pen with a nice, sturdy lever-filler. I mean really, the only branding I can find is a tiny letter "A" engraved at the end of the lever. So I had no choice to brand it "A". I believe it's a pen from the 30's. The "Cracked Ice" celluloid and the trims are very nice and handsome. I put a Waterman IDEAL flex nib on it because the feed happens to work well with it.