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julesjonesI took the the week off after Worldcon earlier this month, and one of the things I did was maintenance on a handful of my fountain pens. This included a Paili 013 vacuum filler. The resulting thread in the #fountain-pens channel on the Anonymous Claire Discord server is under the cut. I also took photos of the dismantling and promised to put them on Dreamwidth. There are no photos of the writing sample, in part because I don't post photos of my handwriting where it could link fannish name with wallet name, but mostly because the thing didn't actually like writing. I don't know how much of that was because I didn't really know how to use a vacuum filler properly - there is a thing where you have to unscrew the blind cap slightly in order to let ink out again when you want to write. But even when I tried that it wouldn't do a lot of writing. From the reviews I've seen there seems to be a quality control issue, and I obviously got one of the duds.
I bought this because I don't have a vacuum filler fountain pen, and I wanted to play with one, and this was a whopping £6 including p&p for one, or even cheaper per pen if you bought three. That's not a lot of money lost if it doesn't work. Alas, it didn't do the writing part of the job, although I did get to play with the filling mechanism. It's a demonstrator and I deliberately bought the clear one rather than one of the coloured transparent ones so that I could watch what it did. That was fun. :-)
This one went in the bin, partly because there was a crack that was probably my doing in the effort to clean it out. At that price I'd definitely consider getting another one in the hope of winning the quality control lottery, but I already have a lot of other cheap pens to play with first.
I bought this because I don't have a vacuum filler fountain pen, and I wanted to play with one, and this was a whopping £6 including p&p for one, or even cheaper per pen if you bought three. That's not a lot of money lost if it doesn't work. Alas, it didn't do the writing part of the job, although I did get to play with the filling mechanism. It's a demonstrator and I deliberately bought the clear one rather than one of the coloured transparent ones so that I could watch what it did. That was fun. :-)
This one went in the bin, partly because there was a crack that was probably my doing in the effort to clean it out. At that price I'd definitely consider getting another one in the hope of winning the quality control lottery, but I already have a lot of other cheap pens to play with first.
Dismantling the pen
First step in maintenance was to empty out what liquid ink there was before I could take it apart to clean out the dried on stuff. After that was remembering how to do the take it apart bit, which I'm recording here because I couldn't remember what I needed to do last time.
First up, this is what it looks like when capped.
To use it, unscrew the cap (obviously), then unscrew the blind cap at the opposite end to the nib. This is where it's going to catch out people who are used to a standard piston or converter fill - you pull the piston rod all the way out, stick the nib in the bottle of ink, and then push the piston back in. This creates a vacuum in the barrel behind the piston, and when the piston reaches the flare in the barrel the there's suddenly a gap around the piston. Vacuum one side, fluid the other, and the fluid rushes into where the vacuum is/was. You get a lovely little fountain of ink inside the barrel, and if you search YouTube you will find unboxing videos with people squeeing with joy over how cute it is.
What caught me out when trying to use it was that the little black rubber plug at the nib end of the piston is a stopper that seals off the inlet valve. This is good when you aren't using the pen, but it blocks the flow of ink when you're using it, and you need to screw the blind cap out a little to pull the stopper away from the valve. I did not know this when initially trying to use it, so it's hardly surprising that it ran dry after a few words.
This is also the start of the dismantling process. There's a metal retaining ring around the the end of the barrel, and once you have the blind cap unscrewed you then unscrew the retaining ring. It can be pretty stiff, but it does unscrew. That allows you to pull the piston mechanism out of the barrel. The black stopper on the end of the rod can then be pulled off.
At the other end, the nib housing will unscrew from the barrel. There's an o-ring between the barrel and the nib unit. Pull the nib unit out of the housing, and you'll find a tiny o-ring between them.
In theory you can then pull the feed and nib out of the sleeve. In theory... Mine wouldn't budge, even after a lot of soaking and ultrasounding to clean out the grunge. Having looked the pen up on Fountain Pen Network I eventually resorted to the advice of cycling between plunging it into very hot water for a few minutes and then very cold water, and after a few rounds of this it did deign to come out. There is an issue with the feed being too large for the barrel in some pens, and this was clearly what I had once I had it out. People on FPN seemed to think that the Yong Sheng was the one with the issue, but mine was the Paili edition. This was what it looked like after fully dismantling it.
I didn't actually fully dismantle it, because there's a screw inside the cap that allows you to take the clip off. It may be possible to dismantle the blind cap, but I wasn't going to try because I thought I would probably break it.
First step in maintenance was to empty out what liquid ink there was before I could take it apart to clean out the dried on stuff. After that was remembering how to do the take it apart bit, which I'm recording here because I couldn't remember what I needed to do last time.
First up, this is what it looks like when capped.
To use it, unscrew the cap (obviously), then unscrew the blind cap at the opposite end to the nib. This is where it's going to catch out people who are used to a standard piston or converter fill - you pull the piston rod all the way out, stick the nib in the bottle of ink, and then push the piston back in. This creates a vacuum in the barrel behind the piston, and when the piston reaches the flare in the barrel the there's suddenly a gap around the piston. Vacuum one side, fluid the other, and the fluid rushes into where the vacuum is/was. You get a lovely little fountain of ink inside the barrel, and if you search YouTube you will find unboxing videos with people squeeing with joy over how cute it is.
What caught me out when trying to use it was that the little black rubber plug at the nib end of the piston is a stopper that seals off the inlet valve. This is good when you aren't using the pen, but it blocks the flow of ink when you're using it, and you need to screw the blind cap out a little to pull the stopper away from the valve. I did not know this when initially trying to use it, so it's hardly surprising that it ran dry after a few words.
This is also the start of the dismantling process. There's a metal retaining ring around the the end of the barrel, and once you have the blind cap unscrewed you then unscrew the retaining ring. It can be pretty stiff, but it does unscrew. That allows you to pull the piston mechanism out of the barrel. The black stopper on the end of the rod can then be pulled off.
At the other end, the nib housing will unscrew from the barrel. There's an o-ring between the barrel and the nib unit. Pull the nib unit out of the housing, and you'll find a tiny o-ring between them.
In theory you can then pull the feed and nib out of the sleeve. In theory... Mine wouldn't budge, even after a lot of soaking and ultrasounding to clean out the grunge. Having looked the pen up on Fountain Pen Network I eventually resorted to the advice of cycling between plunging it into very hot water for a few minutes and then very cold water, and after a few rounds of this it did deign to come out. There is an issue with the feed being too large for the barrel in some pens, and this was clearly what I had once I had it out. People on FPN seemed to think that the Yong Sheng was the one with the issue, but mine was the Paili edition. This was what it looked like after fully dismantling it.
I didn't actually fully dismantle it, because there's a screw inside the cap that allows you to take the clip off. It may be possible to dismantle the blind cap, but I wasn't going to try because I thought I would probably break it.
Commentary on Anonymous Claire
I have, or more accurately had, a Yongsheng 3013 / Paili 013 vacuum fountain pen. The nib went dry very quickly, and I dismantled the pen and cleaned it with the intention of pulling the nib to work on it. The next time I picked it up it had mould inside, so presumably I hadn't let it dry for long enough before reassembling. I disassembled and cleaned it again. Poking at the nib resulted in springing the tines slightly so it was railroading - and still managing to dry out if left unused for more than a second. I put it aside for a few months intending to work on it... The great day has come. I disassembled it this week. There is something blocking the feed. I do not know what the something is - it may be a deposit from the ink, it may be a deposit from the mould. Whatever it is, three days of soaking followed by a nice dip in the ultrasound bath has cleared only part of it. This pen has kicked the bucket, shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleeding choir invisible. This is an ex-parr... er, pen.
I have, or more accurately had, a Yongsheng 3013 / Paili 013 vacuum fountain pen. The nib went dry very quickly, and I dismantled the pen and cleaned it with the intention of pulling the nib to work on it. The next time I picked it up it had mould inside, so presumably I hadn't let it dry for long enough before reassembling. I disassembled and cleaned it again. Poking at the nib resulted in springing the tines slightly so it was railroading - and still managing to dry out if left unused for more than a second. I put it aside for a few months intending to work on it... The great day has come. I disassembled it this week. There is something blocking the feed. I do not know what the something is - it may be a deposit from the ink, it may be a deposit from the mould. Whatever it is, three days of soaking followed by a nice dip in the ultrasound bath has cleared only part of it. This pen has kicked the bucket, shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleeding choir invisible. This is an ex-parr... er, pen.
Except I liked the idea of a vacuumatic. I want one of these, if only because it is so charmingly silly. There are mixed reviews online, so there is definitely a quality control issue; even so, I am very tempted to get another one.
(Some hours later)
I have finally managed to pull the nib and feed from the housing. The feed looks most unhappy. Now contemplating whether to sacrifice a feed from an even cheaper pen, or bin this one and buy a new one.
(The next day)
I have resuscitated it. I am also not putting it in any ink that will go anywhere near other pens, so I filled it with one of the sample vials from the Worldcon meet. I have learnt that I should have checked that I had screwed those two sections of barrel together as tightly as possible after cleaning and reassembling. Diamine Failing Upwards seems to be a brighter shade on skin than on paper... Having scratched a channel in the feed a bit deeper with a pin, it seems to be drawing ink to the nib better than it had been, so I suspect a slight moulding flaw in the feed may have been contributing to the ink flow problems. There's a crack in the feed housing so it will probably be hitting the bin sooner rather than later, but it may make it to Eastercon for the entertainment value of a demonstrator vacuum filler, assuming nobody else has one.
(Half an hour later)
And... it's going in the bin. Takes longer to go dry after fiddling, but still needs to be reprimed after an A5 side, and doing so results in a load of ink getting between the feed housing and the barrel, and thence through the crack. Don't think I'll bother getting a replacement.
Well, it was interesting to dismantle the thing to see how it was put together. I have photos of the dismantling, which will be going on my DreamWidth at some point for the amusement and edification of anyone else who wants to take one apart. Someone on Fountain Pen Network who'd had similar problems reported that the feed appeared to be slightly too big for the housing, and had been wedged in, with some of the fins on the collector being bent when they took it out. I saw the same thing - and that once I had it out, it was relatively easy to move it after I put it back in, so I think there was some dried gunk making it stick even more tightly.
A while back I bought a set of 4 Wing Sung 3008s, and two of them have also developed cracks around the feed housing that leak ink, but they a) are half the price of a 3013, b) actually work. I was planning on buying another set to replace the cracked ones because I like them so much they were my go-to pen at work, but then I tried out the Kaweco Perkeo I'd bought I while back and that has a very nice nib as well. It is still cheap enough that I will not cry too much if someone walks off with it, even if it costs as much for one as it does for a set of four 3008s. The drawback is that it isn't a demonstrator, so I can't see the pretty inks; whereas the 3008s are demonstrator piston fillers that can even be dismantled fairly easily to clean out shimmer inks. But in the course of checking how much a new 3013 would cost me I discovered the 3003. At £3 for one or £12.40 for 5 I am very tempted to get a new toy...
(Some hours later)
I have finally managed to pull the nib and feed from the housing. The feed looks most unhappy. Now contemplating whether to sacrifice a feed from an even cheaper pen, or bin this one and buy a new one.
(The next day)
I have resuscitated it. I am also not putting it in any ink that will go anywhere near other pens, so I filled it with one of the sample vials from the Worldcon meet. I have learnt that I should have checked that I had screwed those two sections of barrel together as tightly as possible after cleaning and reassembling. Diamine Failing Upwards seems to be a brighter shade on skin than on paper... Having scratched a channel in the feed a bit deeper with a pin, it seems to be drawing ink to the nib better than it had been, so I suspect a slight moulding flaw in the feed may have been contributing to the ink flow problems. There's a crack in the feed housing so it will probably be hitting the bin sooner rather than later, but it may make it to Eastercon for the entertainment value of a demonstrator vacuum filler, assuming nobody else has one.
(Half an hour later)
And... it's going in the bin. Takes longer to go dry after fiddling, but still needs to be reprimed after an A5 side, and doing so results in a load of ink getting between the feed housing and the barrel, and thence through the crack. Don't think I'll bother getting a replacement.
Well, it was interesting to dismantle the thing to see how it was put together. I have photos of the dismantling, which will be going on my DreamWidth at some point for the amusement and edification of anyone else who wants to take one apart. Someone on Fountain Pen Network who'd had similar problems reported that the feed appeared to be slightly too big for the housing, and had been wedged in, with some of the fins on the collector being bent when they took it out. I saw the same thing - and that once I had it out, it was relatively easy to move it after I put it back in, so I think there was some dried gunk making it stick even more tightly.
A while back I bought a set of 4 Wing Sung 3008s, and two of them have also developed cracks around the feed housing that leak ink, but they a) are half the price of a 3013, b) actually work. I was planning on buying another set to replace the cracked ones because I like them so much they were my go-to pen at work, but then I tried out the Kaweco Perkeo I'd bought I while back and that has a very nice nib as well. It is still cheap enough that I will not cry too much if someone walks off with it, even if it costs as much for one as it does for a set of four 3008s. The drawback is that it isn't a demonstrator, so I can't see the pretty inks; whereas the 3008s are demonstrator piston fillers that can even be dismantled fairly easily to clean out shimmer inks. But in the course of checking how much a new 3013 would cost me I discovered the 3003. At £3 for one or £12.40 for 5 I am very tempted to get a new toy...