Sailor Converters

The Sailor Pen Company is arguably one of the most interesting pen manufacturers nowadays. The craftsmanship tradition –so keen to Japan— is alive and well in the company through the hands and expertise of Mr. Nobuyoshi Nagahara. His specialty nibs are –dare I say— the most interesting, and one of the few truly innovative, features in the world of fountain pens today.

The Cross nib by Nagahara for Sailor.

However, those nibs –many of which are voracious ink guzzlers— are rarely matched with equally generous ink deposits. Actually, Sailor’s policy regarding ink storage relies in small converters and cartridges, with the single exception of the Realo line of piston-filler pens. This is very unsatisfactory for many users.

That beautiful nib is accompanied by this sad converter... This pen is called “Mannenhitsu Doraku” (万年筆度楽).

And the pain of this limitation goes further as there is a great variety of behaviors within the brand. We could categorize Sailor pens in one of the following groups:

-- Pens that use very specific cartridges and converters—the ultra slim Chalana series. I will not speak about these pens on this chronicle.

-- Pens that use regular Sailor-proprietary cartridges –and only cartridges.

-- Pens that use proprietary cartridges and converters, but the later need to be modified in some way.

-- Pens that use cartridge and converters without any modification.

--Finally, some pens –the already mentioned Realo series— have their self-filling mechanism.

All these five Sailor can use cartridges, but only some of them can use converters, and in different ways.

The pens, from the previous picture showing their insides. From left to right: the first pen can only use cartridges; the second can use modified converters without the central ring; the third can use shortened converters; the fourth can use unmodified converters without the central ring; and the fifth can use untouched regular converters.

From left to right: a Sailor proprietary regular cartridge; a shortened converter without the central ring; a shortened converter with the central ring; an unmodified converter without the central ring; and finally the untouched regular converter.

Costs and capacities of Sailor cartridge and converters. Chalana cartridges and converters are not included.

All these categories might not be so unusual was it not because of the number of different modifications the converter needs to fit. And that shows some lack of consistency in the pen design:


-- Some pocket pens are so short that there is no room for the present converter to fit in no matter how short we might make it. Some sources say that an old converter existed for these pocket pens, but I have never seen it.


-- Another group of pocket pens have their section's bore too narrow for the converter’s metallic ring. Therefore, they need to have the converter shortened in the same way Platinum converters had to be modified to fit inside Platinum pocket pens, and the central converter's ring removed.


-- A third group of pocket pens need a shortened converter, but there is no need to remove the metallic ring.


-- Some full size pens have their barrels too thin for the converter’s ring. Again, the only option —other than the cartridge, that is— is to remove the converter’s ring.


-- And of course, there are some pens in which the converter fits without any modification.

All in all, Sailor shows a great interest in creating the most exciting nibs in the market and forgets about how to keep the ink inside the pen. The unbalance between those outstanding nibs and this poor looking converter is too shocking to oversee. Truly disappointing.

(Pilot Volex demonstrator H475 – Diamine Evergreen)

Bruno Taut
(March 3rd, 2011)
[labels: Sailor, conversor, soluciones técnicas]

Stars (III)

Today’s pen is a black ebonite eyedropper with hoshiawase shut-off system by Pilot.


The section with the concentric cylinders of the shut-off system indicates that this pen was manufactured during the last years of existence of this shut-off system. It is more elaborate than in earlier pens. My sources from Pilot company say it comes back from early 1928, despite the fact that some others claim the hoshiawase system was phased out in 1926.

Modern, more elaborate, hoshiawase system, from 1926-1928.

Hoshiawase cylinders from around 1920.

This particular pen only shows the band name on the barrel and no other ornament.

It is a small pen—just 98 mm long capped and 8 grams.

The Pilot nib.

The nib is a flexible 14 K gold in size 1.

(Pilot Volex Black – Montegrappa Turquoise)

Bruno Taut
In exile, March 4, 2011
[labels: Pilot, soluciones técnicas]

Pandora's Box

Once the lid is open we all know it is just not possible to close the box and pretend nothing had happened.

I —and many others— succeeded in implementing a different nib in a Twsbi Diamond and there is no way back. I did that with a Pilot no. 5 nib in 14 K gold. It not only worked well but also looked beautiful—the rhodiated nib matched perfectly with the silver accents of the pen.

A Twsbi Diamond 530 with a 14 K medium nib.

Pilot manufactures that nib in eleven different variations, which allow us to create eleven different chimeras. One of the most interesting might be a Twsbi Diamond 530 with a music nib. Indeed a good match—the high ink demands of the double-slit nib are supplied by a big ink deposit and a beautiful piston.

A Twsbi Diamond 530 with a 14 K music nib.

Another options I have explored are Sailor’s. The junior nib fits wonderfully on the Twsbi. The result is a nice looking demonstrator with a smooth 21 K gold nib. The only problem is the lack of color coordination between nib and decorative elements—clip, rings, etc.

A Twsbi Diamond with a 21 K medium fine nib.

Other Twsbi users have tried other combinations. Pelikan nibs from models 200, 400 and 600 seem to fit well and are easily available in the market. And those come in a variety of styles including oblique points.

So, we all opened the box and the field is ready for our experiments. Twsbi company, on its side, might want to supply more exciting nibs on their already interesting pens. But if Twsbi did not try, we users have already open Pandora’s box. We are already working on it, doing our best. And with good results.

(Pilot Decimo – Sailor Yama-dori)

Bruno Taut
(Madrid, February 28th, 2011)
[labels: Twsbi, Pelikan, Pilot, Sailor]

Platinum Converters

I already mentioned the fact that Platinum pocket pens cannot use the current Platinum converter. However, there are some options to this clear inconvenient:

From left to right, empty Platinum cartridge, current Platinum piston converter, modified Platinum converter, and old type Platinum converter for pocket pens.

— Use Platinum proprietary cartridges, either new or by refilling them.

— Use an adapter to use short international cartridges or short converters (squeezer type).

— Adapt the current Platinum piston converter to fit inside the pocket pen, as was already described on these chronicles.

— Finally, find an old Platinum converter.

The following table summarizes the cost of these options:

Prices in yen without taxes. Those of the old Platinum converter and the adapter for international cartridges are taken from the Internet. These prices can change a lot among sellers.

The old converter is hard to find, expensive and poorly made. But it holds more ink that the current converter, especially when the later is modified to fit in a pocket pen.

My choice is pretty straightforward—I refill cartridges with a syringe.

(Pilot Décimo – Sailor Yama-dori)

Bruno Taut
(Madrid, February 27-28th, 2011)
[labels: Platinum, conversor]

Matching (VII)

The controversy is always there: Is that pen original or a copy of another? Which company did father that idea? Sometimes, the answers are clear…

Most pen nibs do write when turned upside down. The ink flow is scarce, the line is thinner, and, more often than not, the feeling is far from being smooth. But the ink is there, ready to be used. So it was only natural that sooner or later someone would try to take benefit of it.

The black Platinum is one centimeter shorter than the Parker model when closed: 12.3 vs 13.3 cm.

The two nibs on display today were designed in the seventies to write on both sides.

Posted, the Platinum becomes 1.3 cm longer than the Parker: 15.3 and 14.0 cm, respectively.

The Parker 180, well known in the West, was in the market between 1977 and 1985 in a number of styles. These pens had two possible nib combinations—either extra fine and medium or fine and broad.

The feeds of both pens are on the right hand side of the nib on this picture.

The Platinum PKW-5000 pocket pen predates the Parker 180 in some years. The nib combination in this case is extra fine and fine, and comes in a formal black pocket pen style, as many other pens in Japan during the 1970s.

Close-up of the tips. The fine line of the Platinum, on the right, looks a lot thinner than that of Parker's.

However, the origin of this type of nib lies in the 1966 Sheaffer’s model called Stylist.

My thanks to Kinno-san.

(Élysée in black with steel nib – Parker washable Blue)

Bruno Taut
In exile, February 27th, 2011
[labels: plumín, Sheaffer, Parker, Platinum]

T-shiki (T-式)

Five were the filling systems Pilot used on its pens during the early years of the company: safety (L-shiki, L-式), hoshiawase or star system (N-shiki), eyedropper (O-shiki), plunger filler (P-shiki), and lever filler (T-shiki).


Today’s pen is a lever filler black chased hard rubber (BCHR) pen equipped with a 14 carat gold nib in size 2.


Its dimensions are 126 mm in length and 12 g uninked.


The barrel has the brand name and the old company logo –an N encircled by a lifebuoy— engraved.


The ringtop is also made of 14 carat gold.

Its overall condition is fairly good, and it is ready to be inked and used.

(Twsbi Diamond 530 with a Pilot 5 nib – Sailor Yama-dori)

Bruno Taut
(Madrid, February 25th, 2011)
[labels: Pilot]

Alchemy

Some days ago I expressed my surprise about the unusual expectations raised by some new inks. Sure I contributed to it, but it always amazes me how easy we stylophiles are as targets for any marketing operation.

The question now is whether there were any real grounds for this excitement. Are those Mix-free inks that unique?

Mixability seems to be the main argument people use to favor these inks. Therefore, it might be worth to remind that there are many other mixable inks in the market.

Sailor Jentle inks are some of them, as the regular ink events by this company show. On those, the ink master creates the color of your choice by mixing Sailor inks in the adequate proportions.

The Sailor ink master —Mr. Ishimaru— at work in Machida, Tokyo (April 2010).

German inks Standardgraph, on their side, offer a gamut of 22 mixable inks.

Some of the mixable 22 Standardgraph inks. Picture taken from the Standardgraph catalog.

In any event, mixing inks is not a dangerous experiment provided some basic precautions were taken:

— Do all the mixing in a container and shake well before filling any pen with the mixture. Should it react, the deposit would appear in the container, thus preventing us from using it in any pen.

— Avoid mixing pigmented and washable inks together to be on the safe side. Although if done following the previous rule nothing grievous should happen.

— Should we need more precautions, start by inking a cheap pen –the market is full of them— before filling that one-hundred year old pen in pristine condition inherited from some eccentric ancestor…

The Platinum mixing kit. Probably, the most interesting item in the whole marketing operation, no matter how overpriced it might be. Those elements is all we need to start mixing--some eyedroppers and some containers.

I know many of us have enough inks at home to start out tests without waiting for any official permission from Platinum—or any other ink maker. Let the alchemy begin!

Finally, do we really need nine inks to create exotic colors? Or twenty two? Call me naïve, but I thought that three –yellow, red and blue— were enough.

My thanks to Ms. Olga Portús.

(Pilot Custom 74 SM tuned by Mr. Yamada – Pelikan Royal Blue)

Bruno Taut
(Madrid, February 19th, 2011)
[labels: tinta, Platinum, Standardgraph, Sailor]