Welcome to- The Fountain Pen Community!

Welcome to The Community!!

Frank

Frank & DWL, Thanks for the kind welcome.
My collecting /using tastes ..... I guess some would say I have no taste as yet. I am actually a woodworker.. made the slimline pens. That gave way to kit FPs and that reminded me of this neat looking fountain pen my dad had when I was a kid. It was an odd light blue, the nib was shrouded in a slanted plastic.... yep, a Parker 51. I learned that thanks to ebay. I bought some old junker pens and a couple of restored "vintage" pens. I have a motley assortment of Esterbrooks, Wearevers, Parkers, Majestics..... and an odd duck that I have discovered is an old P24 Conklin Crescent in pretty darned pristine shape (from an antique shop) that I returned to working condition (I hesitate to call it restored since it is a bit lusterless in the BCHR department) but it looks nice and writes surprisingly well( to me anyway). I even had a bottle of Higgins India Ink to use! Ha! I heard that groan all the way from here! Fortunately I have gleaned enough sense from these forums to know better than to use that stuff so I ordered a bottle of Quink. OK, not fancy or perhaps even "stylish" but it works. I think that my collecting tastes are pretty much inclined toward vintage stuff and custom pens although I am very much a neophite and cannot fathom the rationality of a $1000+ pen. My finances simply would not allow me to seriously entertain such a purchase at this point. , So... Cheap and kinda old, like me.
My using tastes are slightly egocentric.... I began chronicaling my life for posterity since I know so little about my grandparents or any generation before them, I decided to "buy my great grand kids a drink" in the form of a very informal autobiography in personal letter form..... blah, blah, blah..... it is MY excuse for copious amounts of writing with a FP. Seems everybody here has one.
I have 18 sample bottles of Noodlers on order, as well as various sizes of bladders (sacs), J-bars, shellac, section pliers, nibs ... you know where I am headed with this. I have returned 18 pens to functionality...some not so pretty and one in particular that is a true "Frankenstein" that incorporates pieces of foreign species.... couldnt figure out how to resore an Esterbrook with a broken piston...I removed the piston and fashioned a "bayonet" to the rear of the section to accept cartidge or converter. It is truly hideous, but it works. Since then I have spent hours each day reading, researching, locating suppliers, copying catalog posts for ID purposes and basically succumbing to my new addiction. I am also a lapidary..... this means that for a couple of these old low end pens there are new feeds in their futures , made of colorless sapphire. My idea of FP "tuition". I have the means and machinery to do it, we'll see how well it works. I can envision a Bexley sacrificed to harvest the section, cap clip and nib to be resurrected in a barrel and cap made from Australian Red Mallee Burl, double jeweled with medium blue sapphires and a matching sapphire feed. I am anxious to try that. Perhaps not a Bexley..who knows, there's time to find an "organ donor".
More than ya really wanted to know eh? lol

Sounds like you have 'the pen bug' in a major way...lol.

I'm really looking forward to the sapphire feed idea. That sounds REALLY cool in my book.