I haven't the foggiest idea what you are talking about. I jog with wild lions all the time.
How often do you clean your pen?
- Thread starter Dominic
- Start date
I haven't the foggiest idea what you are talking about. I jog with wild lions all the time.
What about a TWSBI? When you unscrew the nib, there is a connector that plugs in to TWSBI’s ink bottles. It looks to me like you would have to disassemble the other end. I’m not too keen on doing that since then you have to lube everything, including the pieces that use bearing grease.I have found that the great advantage of the Pelikan design is that the nib section easily unscrews and, best as I can tell, is actually designed to be unscrewed by users (unlike, say, disassembling a Pilot 823 which voids the warranty). So I pull the nib and flush it with the bulb syringe and then use the bulb syringe to flush out the ink reservoir. Easy peasy. Much faster than drawing in and expelling water with the piston knob, and I imagine less wear and tear on the moving parts. I sure hope I'm not courting disaster cleaning them that way.
Rhody
I'm a Lumberjack.
I think staying up on cleaning is a key. Example I’ve been using a shimmer ink in one pen and after a few fill ups I cleaned it with water and a bulb and it didn’t take long at all.
tankerjohn
A little poofier than I prefer
TWISBI actually gives a wrench with the pen to disassemble it, don’t they? I didn’t know they had a connector for the ink bottles. How slick. I hope that spares people inky fingers. Though, I rather enjoy dunking the nib straight into the bottle. It feels old timey and satisfying, inky fingers and all.
Only when I put it away for storage. I might flush it with water a few times every 4-5 fills.
They do include the wrench, but not any information about what bearing grease is. They also include a vial with silicone grease for the rubber parts.
tankerjohn
A little poofier than I prefer
From what I know about pens, 100% pure silicone grease is the only grease you should use in a pen. I'm sure that's what TWISBI provided with the pen. Certainly, never put petroleum-based products in a pen. I don't own a TWISBI, so I'm not sure what the lubing instructions are. But like most instructions translated from Asian languages, there might be some translation issues. It would be worth contacting TWISBI customer service or the retailer you bought the pen from to clarify the maintenance requirements.
This was enclosed with the pen. They did include the silicon grease, but note the paper said the bearing grease is not included. Very confusing.
tankerjohn
A little poofier than I prefer
That is confusing. Contact the company/distributer. Or if you don’t want to do that, I’m sure this topic is addressed somewhere on Fountain Pen Network or Reddit. These are very popular pens.
TWSBI’s customer service is historically top notch. Contact them and ask. You should get a quick response.
What they are saying is "Don't wipe the silicon grease off the mechanism" and "we used to not send extra".
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
I've come to the conclusion, I clean my pens far too often.
I keep (or have tried to) just three pens in circulation at any time. One blue (or black), one green/purple/brown, and one red/orange. I fill it, use it for that one fill, then fully clean it before stowing it away. So a pen that used Std Int'l carts will get cleaned after every cart. Excessive! At least now, I've taken to cleaning them with a converter, rather than pulling the nib and feed every time, but it's still too much.
I've been looking into how I might cycle through inks, and have a wash somewhere in that cycle. For example, I have one piston filler. I could start with Sherwood Green ink, and when that's finished, refuel it with Teal, then Twilight, then Bilberry, then Grape. Then clean it out and start over again. One flush every five fills. To me that makes sense... for that pen.
With cartridges/converters (which is ALL my other pens), it seems less simple. There's less ink in a cartridge, so by the time it's hit its true colour (if not using the same colour again), it's half empty. That applies whether loading a new cart, or refilling the old one with a syringe, and if I stick to the same colour, that doesn't give me a prompt as to whether it's due for a clean or not. I haven't squared that circle yet.
The same applies on pens I keep a converter in. If I swap ink, it needs a flush... in which case, I'll ink up a different pen while the first one is drying, then stow it away. I do like changing ink colours when one has run out, as with so many options in the drawer, it feel wrong to refill it with what I've just used. I might need to break that pattern of behaviour, and follow the same sequence I'm considering for the piston filler... but then a converter will cycle through quicker, leaving me with two pens of the same colour for a while...
As you can tell, this idea isn't fully formed yet. Needs garlic...
I keep (or have tried to) just three pens in circulation at any time. One blue (or black), one green/purple/brown, and one red/orange. I fill it, use it for that one fill, then fully clean it before stowing it away. So a pen that used Std Int'l carts will get cleaned after every cart. Excessive! At least now, I've taken to cleaning them with a converter, rather than pulling the nib and feed every time, but it's still too much.
I've been looking into how I might cycle through inks, and have a wash somewhere in that cycle. For example, I have one piston filler. I could start with Sherwood Green ink, and when that's finished, refuel it with Teal, then Twilight, then Bilberry, then Grape. Then clean it out and start over again. One flush every five fills. To me that makes sense... for that pen.
With cartridges/converters (which is ALL my other pens), it seems less simple. There's less ink in a cartridge, so by the time it's hit its true colour (if not using the same colour again), it's half empty. That applies whether loading a new cart, or refilling the old one with a syringe, and if I stick to the same colour, that doesn't give me a prompt as to whether it's due for a clean or not. I haven't squared that circle yet.
The same applies on pens I keep a converter in. If I swap ink, it needs a flush... in which case, I'll ink up a different pen while the first one is drying, then stow it away. I do like changing ink colours when one has run out, as with so many options in the drawer, it feel wrong to refill it with what I've just used. I might need to break that pattern of behaviour, and follow the same sequence I'm considering for the piston filler... but then a converter will cycle through quicker, leaving me with two pens of the same colour for a while...
As you can tell, this idea isn't fully formed yet. Needs garlic...
not very often
Hardly ever! 
Seriously, I mostly re-ink and will only flush a pen if it is going to be put away for a length of time.
The modern fetish for field-stripping pens at every fill, or worse, some weekly interval, is boggling to me. Pens are designed to hold ink. And if they seal correctly (and they should, otherwise it is a dud IMO), you can leave ink in there for months on end. I know, I have.
Seriously, I mostly re-ink and will only flush a pen if it is going to be put away for a length of time.
The modern fetish for field-stripping pens at every fill, or worse, some weekly interval, is boggling to me. Pens are designed to hold ink. And if they seal correctly (and they should, otherwise it is a dud IMO), you can leave ink in there for months on end. I know, I have.
I’m the same. The main thing is to use it regularly. As long as you are writing with it and there’s plenty of ink going through the feed that’s all you need.
I have three pens and each has a dedicated ink that never changes. They are always inked up. The inks are either permanent or iron gall. You don’t want to let those dry out in the pen. They never go more than a few days without being used.
- Thread starter
- #56
I started by cleaning at each refill. Now I clean if refilling with a different ink but do not clean if refilling with the same ink.
I received a Montblanc 146 in 1979 upon graduation. Its first flush and clean was in 2012
Rhody
I'm a Lumberjack.
And when there is a new post here I realize I’ve been remiss and feel guilty.
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
After mixing a couple of old ink samples together, which I wasn't enamoured with separately (I can't even remember what they were), my Wing Sung 3008 was really not very happy with the result. The feed just wasn't keeping up with the nib at all, and so I decided to dump the ink and flush the pen. Pulling water in and out with the piston, did a fine job on the demonstrator barrel, but did nothing to clear the gobbed up feed, so I mixed up a little soapy water, and brew that into the tank instead. As soon as the piston went tight, I realised my error. Hello soap, goodbye silicon grease. So I ended up doing a full strip down and thorough clean, followed by an online tour of all the pen shops that have sold out of grease 
A rather trying pen day. Ebay to the rescue though, and a tin should drop through my letterbox on Tuesday.
Hooray for spare pens
A rather trying pen day. Ebay to the rescue though, and a tin should drop through my letterbox on Tuesday. Hooray for spare pens
Not often enough probably
