Brazilian Capless (III)

The following ad appeared June 1968 in the Brazilian magazine Realidade:

Realidade. June 1968.

We see two different Capless models on it. On top, a C-300GW made in Brazil like the one described on a previous Chronicle. And right under it, a long RW unit.

Just like the pen shown on the following picture—a RW Capless marketed in Brazil:

Capless C-100RW.

It is made in Japan and its manufacturing dates are June 1st 1967 (HF01) for the body and June of 1967 for the nib. A converter is included, and in fact it is of the type we saw attached to the model C-3000GW made in Brazil.

Steel nib made June 1967.

So all looks fine, right? Well, not really.

As we have also seen on these pages, the RW pens could implement both steel and gold nibs, And the external difference was on the clip: a golden clip was associated to gold nibs, and silver clips to steel nibs. And this pen has a steel nib and a golden clip.

I am well aware that replacing the nib in a Capless pen is a trivial matter. However, the manufacturing dates of nib and body match perfectly –June of 1967-, and a second RW unit also marketed in Brazil had this same association of clip and nib.

Therefore I think there are grounds to consider that the RW Capless sent to Brazil were somehow special in the combination of clip and nib. And this is a question our Brazilian friends could answer.


My thanks to TM.

Sailor Profit Sr, 18 K HB nib – Sailor Blue

Bruno Taut
April 27th 2023
etiquetas: Pilot, Capless, Brasil

Brazilian Capless (II)

NOTE (April 23rd, 2023): I have added a couple of sentences and a picture of the instruction sheet to show the lack of mention to ink cartridges re how to ink the Brazilian Capless.


There is nothing like reading the pen.

Some months ago I published a text on the very obscure Pilot Capless made in Brazil. Now I have on such pen in my hands and can look further into the details.

The Brazilian Capless. A revolutionary pen, apparently.

A direct comparison between these two pens shows some subtle differences:

Brazilian on top (teal), Japanese on bottom (red).

– The Brazilian pen implements a steel nib, and both nib and body are labeled as products of the “Industria Brasileira” (imprints “IND. BRAS.” and “IND. BRASILEIRA).

On its side, the Japanese Capless sports a 14 K gold nib marked with the JIS logo and imprint “MADE IN JAPAN”.

The Brazilian engraving is fainter than the Japanese. Note also the old Pilot logo --with the L underlining the O-- on the Brazilian nib.

– The central ring on these Capless are different. It is a groove on the Japanese pen, and is flat on the Brazilian unit.

The very different central ring. Brazilian on top, Japanese on bottom.

– Contrary to what I had said, the Brazilian pen does use a converter. It is a form of CON-W, as the nipple corresponds to a double-spare cartridge.

In this regards, both the Japanese and the Brazilian Capless are not different. However, the Japanese pen was not marketed with the converter attached.

The nib unit with the red tail corresponds to the Brazilian pen, with the converter attached. The Japanese unit shows a metallic sheath to cover the cartriges and provide the necessary length for the release mechanism to operate.

We could question then whether double-spare cartridges were actually marketed in Brazil or these pens –and others like later Capless and the model 77- relied solely on inkwells as ink supply. In fact, the instruction sheet of this Capless pen does not mention the use of cartridges at all.

Instruction shet of the Brazilian Capless written, obviously, in Portuguese. To fill the pen, it says, immerse the nib in the inkwell and pump ink into it. There is no mention to any type of cartridge to ink the pen.

All this is relevant because there exist the question of whether this Brazilian Capless was actually made in Brazil or merely assembled in Brazil out of parts sent out from Japan. An obvious third option would have been that the whole pen had been manufactured in Japan and sent to Brazil for the local market.

So far it is not possible to know which one of those possibilities was the right one. Only a peek onto the Brazilian records of Pilot do Brasil would give us a complete answer, but they seem to be off-limits now. In Japan, Pilot does not have records related to the foreign production.

But the details above described, especially those on the different central ring, do point out at a different manufacturing line for the Brazilian Capless.

Because in the absence of records there is nothing like reading the pen. Instruction sheets are also helpful.


My thanks to TM.

Parker 51 aerometric, burgundy – Tomikei Blue (Sailor)

Bruno Taut
April 20th 2023
etiquetas: Pilot, Capless, Brasil

Brazil Ink (I)

The Pilot Pen Station, the old museum of Pilot Corporation in Tokyo, was an invaluable source of information. In there, more than ten years ago. I took the following picture of an ink bottle of the brand:

24 ounces, 709 ml. It seems Japan was not yet metric in the 1950s...

24 ounces of ink for JPY 270. In rational units, 710 ml assuming US ounces instead of imperial ounces. And the wooden frame speaks about other presentations: 1 ounce for JPY 30, 2 for JPY 50.

This is the 1 ounce inkwell, released initially in 1949:

1 ounce, JPY 30.

And this is the 2 ounce bottle:

In 1954, Pilot built a manufacturing plant in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. And Pilot started making ink in Brazil:

Tinta Pilot. "Industria Brasileira". Note the faint stamped sign saying 709 cm3, the result of rounding down the 709.76... ml in 24 ounces. It seems Brazil was more metric than Japan at the time.

The Pilot Times reproduced some of the ads published in the local media at the time:

Ad published March 9th, 1956 in Folha da Manha. Reported in Pilot Times some months later.

We see how Pilot used the same ink bottles and simply translated the labels. What we do not know is whether the ink followed the same formulation. To check that I need a sample of the Japanese version of the blue-black ink of the time, as we already know it changed with time.


My thanks to TM.

Moonman T2 with Kanwrite nib – Pilot (Thai) Black

Bruno Taut
April 6th 2023
etiquetas: Pilot, tinta, Brasil

The Marzullo Collection

“A maior casa de canetas-tinteiros da America do Sul”. The largest shop of fountain pens in South America—that was the claim of Casa Marzullo in the early 1940s.

Published in A Noite, August 1944.

Might that be right or just a marketing slogan, the fact is that Casa Marzullo was a very prominent stationer in the 1930s in Rio de Janeiro. According to their ads, and there were many of them, Casa Marzullo offered a wide range brands—Sheaffer, Parker, Esterbrook, Pelikan... And Pilot too.

Published in O Jornal, December 1939. Pelikan, Eagle, Sheaffer, ... and Pilot too. Other ads included Montblanc, Esterbrook, and others.

This ad is not specific of Casa Marzullo, although this shop appears among those selling the Pilot 38R on display. Published in O Malho, December 1940.

The Pilot pens we see on those ads, and those by Hachiya Company, are primarily the 38R with “nomikomi-shiki” filling system, “abastecimento magico” in Portuguese. But there is also evidence –although not ads—of high end Pilot pens in Brazil. And those are maki-e decorated pens that somehow ended up in the hands of Casa Marzullo. That is the Marzullo Collection.

The Marzullo Collection.

In all likelihood, these pens were imported by Hachiya, Irmãos e Companhia and passed –or sold— to Casa Marzullo. And they saw the light at the liquidation of the old assets of the stationer.

The set is formed by 10 pens, not all of them complete. Some lack nib and feed, others lack the whole section; a couple of them have their clip damaged or broken. All of them are branded as Pilot, as opposed to those similar pens marketed at the time in the West as Namiki or Dunhill-Namiki.

Their filling systems are “nomikomi-shiki”, albeit these pens lack the internal deposit. This detail is not new on pens from those early 1940s.

A complete section together with nib --size 3-- and feed. The internal deposit is missing.

The pens, or rather their decoration, are signed by some of the heavyweight craftsmen of the Kokkokai: Kõho (光甫), Shõetsu (松悦), Ritsuzan (立山), Shisen (紫川), Shõmi (松美).

Signed by Shõetsu (松悦). Produced by the Namiki Kan, as was the case of all pre-war maki-e pens nade by Pilot-Namiki.

Signed by Shisen (紫川).

Not much else is really known about these pens. Their presence in Brazil is surprising enough, and opens up the possibility of finding other maki-e pens in this and in neighboring countries.

The Marzullo Collection is now in the hands of a Brazilian stylophile.

Pilot Custom 74, Yamada Seisakusho – Diamine Teal

TM - BT
March 28th, 2023
labels: Brasil, Pilot, maki-e

The Hachiya Brothers

The country of Brazil has already shown up on these Chronicles. Pilot built its first manufacturing plant in this country in 1954, and since then pens and inks an other products have supplied the local market.

But the history of Pilot in Brazil started some years before that 1954.

Undated ad of Hachiya e Irmãos.

The migration of Japanese people to the Americas started by the end of 1800s with the end of the “closed country” policy of Japan. First they went to Hawaii and North America, but the 1908 gentleman's agreement between Japan the US redirected those migrating movements to Latin America. As a result, Brazil became the home to the largest number of descendants of Japanese in the world.

Almanak Laemmert, 1915. Reference of the company Hachiya e Irmão, located in the street Theophilo Ottoni 99.

The first member of the Hachiya (蜂谷) family to arrive in Brazil was Gosuke Hachiya in 1907. By 1910 the Hachiya company was founded to import Japanese products –chinaware from Nagoya, celluloid goods from Osaka--, and to export semi-precious stones from Brazil.

Undated ad of Franklin pens signed by Hachiya, Irmãos e Companhia.

And by 1938, the Hachiya, Irmãos e Companhia (Hachiya, Brothers and Co.) started offering fountain pens. The first mention is about a brand called Franklin, a name used by Pilot for export pens in those years. And in March of 1939 Hachiya the ads were about Pilot pens directly.

Among them we can see the well known 38R with the easy-drinking –nomikomi— filling system, dubbed in Portuguese as “abastecimento magico”.

Vida domestica, 1939. Ad of Pilot pens: duravel, bonita, mais barata. Durable, beautiful, inexpensive!

O Cruzeiro, 1940.

All this came to an end in December of 1941 with the Pearl Harbor attack and the beginning of the war between Japan and the US.

Hachiya Irmãos tried to re-structure the company to avoid the confiscation of assets. That, in fact, took place four months later—in March of 1942 the Brazilian government ordered the confiscation of all goods owned by German, Italian and Japanese citizens.

Hachiya Irmãos was effectively dissolved in March of 1944.

So this is, in summary, the short history of Pilot in Brazil before the War. And in another text we will speak about some of the pens from that period found in Brazil.

Lamy Al-Star – Lamy Blue

TM - BT
March 24th, 2023
labels: Brasil, Pilot

The Brazilian Icon

One could be forgiven for thinking that not much can be said about iconic pens. After all, being iconic means that they are well-known and documented, and people even write monographs about them!

The Pilot Capless/Namiki Vanishing Point does not yet have a monograph, but sure it is an iconic pen—one of the few Japanese icons in the world of pens. So, is it mostly all known about this family of pens?

I thought so, but reality is always surprising.

The first Pilot Capless –the C-600MW-- was marketed in 1963, and in the following years newer models were released in a trend that lasts until today. And all of them were made in Japan.

Or were they?

It looked like that until I saw a Capless made in Brazil.

Industria Brasileira.

Industria Brasileira.

We know Pilot created a manufacturing plant in Brazil in 1954. Inks and pens and other stationery products have been and are produced in there. Now, which pen models were made in Brazil? I described the model 77, and a commentator mentioned a model 88. And, what about the Capless?

In essence, this Brazilian model is equivalent to the C-300GW model made in Japan between 1964 and 1971, but there are some differences:

The Japanese C-300GW. Gold nib, cartridge/converter filling.

– The Brazilian nib is made of steel.

– The Brazilian filling system is built in the nib unit and cannot be detached from it. At least, not in a trivial way. Therefore, the use of cartridges is not an option on this pen.

These differences are consistent with path other Pilot pens followed when made in overseas plants—downgraded and simplified. Simplification in this case means not having to deal with the production and distribution of ink cartridges.

The Brazilian box.

As usual, this pen raises more questions than it answers:

– When was this pen made? Was it contemporary to the Japanese counterpart or was its production moved to Brazil once the Japanese pen had been discontinued?

– Was it fully made in Brazil or assembled from Japan-made parts?

– Where were this Brazilian Capless marketed?

Pilot Japan holds very few records about foreign production of pens.

And the quest for information continues.


My thanks to TM.

Mannenhitsu-no Yamada – Noodler's Apache Sunset

Bruno Taut
August 22nd, 2022
etiquetas: Pilot, Brasil, Capless

Industria Brasileira

Years ago, in 2013, I wrote a Chronicle on the Brazilian plant built by Pilot in 1954. I inserted some local ad and some reports published on the Pilot Times, the internal magazine of the company.

Pilot pens and inks made (or assembled) in Brazil.

Now, six years later, I want to complete the information with the description of a pen produced in that Brazilian plant of Pilot´s--the Pilot 77.

This pen is indeed a member of the Super family of pens made by Pilot in the late 1950s and early 1960s. In fact, its nib is remarkably similar --if not the same-- to the unit present in the model Super 150, a late arrival to the family. The difference is that the Brazilian nib is made of steel instead of gold, and is not dated.

Pilot 77´s steel nib. No gold, no date.

Pilot Super 150´s steel nib. 14 K gold, JIS mark, August of 1962.

The filling system is the well-known "hose-shiki" that we can find in Pilot pens between 1955 and 1964. The body, made of plastic, carries the inscription "PILOT 77 / IND. BRASILEIRA".

The engraving reads "PILOT 77 / IND. BRASILEIRA".

Two questions arise in here: When the pen was made, and whether it was manufactured in Brazil or just assembled with parts made in Japan.

To the first, my best guess given the simmilarities with the Super 150, is that this Brazilian (Super) 77 was made in the mid 1960s.

To the second, I am inclined to think that the parts were Japanese and were assembled in Brazil. The reason being that there are no differences between the components of this pen and those seen on the Japanese units.

These are the dimensions of this pen:
Length closed: 132 mm
Length open: 118 mm
Length posted: 147.5 mm
Diameter: 11.2 mm
Weight: 13.9 g (dry)
Ink deposit: 0.6 ml

Pilot do Brasil remains in business as producer of stationery goods. However, and despite the new manufacturing plant open in 2013, Pilot do Brasil does not make fountain pens nowadays, and the only fountain pen-related item produced in that plant is fountain pen ink in blue in bottles of 500 ml (::1::, ::2::).

Pilot ink made in Brazil.
(Picture taken from http://www.pilotpen.com.br/).

My thanks to my friend Panchovel.

Romillo WiPens – Montblanc Irish Green

Bruno Taut
Madrid, November 24th, 2019
etiquetas: Brasil, Pilot, tinta