Fountain Pen Cartridges

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keithbyrd

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I searched for an answer but didn't find it - Do ink cartridges get old and dry out? I have had a pack of 12 Private Reserve for about 2 years - maybe a little longer.
I have a FP that I have been using for about 2 years and have never had any problems with the ink flow, starting, no skipping etc. I started using these older cartridges and I can't keep it working. Is the age of the ink a problem?
And I have flushed and cleaned the nib and checked tine alignment, and feed/nib alignment.
I will try a cartridge I just got and see what happens.
Thoughts and insights appreciated.
I need to know cause I send a cartridge or two to customers with each FP sold!
 
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You mention that you have had these cartridge for around two years - that's nothing in the life of fountain pen cartridges. Cartridges are typically sold in boxes of 12. It took me about four years to use up the last box of cartridges I bought. I have some Cross cartridges in my desk drawer that have to be at least 30 years old, and they appear to be fine.

That said, Private Reserve had a troubled history. The original owner of the company died without making provisions for continuing the business. Eventually, after a year or so of wrangling, one of his employees was allowed to purchase the business, which she operated for a couple of years before she died a few months ago. At this point, it appears that the trademarks (the Private Reserve name, and the names of the more popular inks) have been acquired by a European ink manufacturer, but that Private Reserve will no longer exist as a separate company. I suspect the cartridges you have date from the first incarnation of the Company, and they could be much older than you think (there's no way of knowing when they were actually produced).

Another thing to consider is that Private Reserve was known for highly saturated inks which could suggest a shorter shelf life.

But I serious doubt that a cartridge could 'dry up' in a couple of years. Cartridges are typically made of polyethelene, a plastic which strongly resists migration of gasses. So I can't imagine that the water component of inks could evaporate and pass through the walls of a cartridge in anything less than decades.

My suspicion is that the problem you are encountering has more to do with the pen feed than with the cartridge. If you follow the fountain pen forums, you will frequently see suggestions that new pens should be flushed with a mild soapy water solution before loading them with ink. I think the idea is that machining oils can be left behind in the feed and section that will impeded the flow of ink; flushing the pen with a thin soap solution gets rid of such contaminants and aids in flow. I've never done that myself although I have had a few pens that displayed a 'hard start' until they had been used for a few days.
 
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Hi Keith,

Check to see if the cartridges are full. I have seen cartridges lose ink over time in the box. Since there was no sign of leakage, my assumption was that there was evaporation of the liquid. This would tend to raise the dye concentration.

Another possibility may be the ink itself. A few years ago Richard Binder posted a warning on his website about some Private Reserve inks causing pen problems as in actually damaging feeds. This was not true of all Private Reserve inks! At the time there was quite a bit of controversy over it. As I recall, the damage would not have been caused by just a few fillings, though. Here's the link to Richard's comment on Private Reserve (about half-way down the page):

Inks: Good, Bad, and Ugly

Feed your fountain pen a steady diet of fountain pen ink. Period. This injunction may seem obvious, but it is not quite so obvious as it appears.
www.richardspens.com www.richardspens.com

Bill

Louie, note that he is talking about a pen that he has been using for a couple of years, not a new one. I agree that a cleaning wouldn't hurt although I would go with a weak 10% household ammonia solution.
 
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The Richard Binder article that Bill referenced notes that some inks are known for presenting clogging problems.

"Clogging. Inks that don't clog score high because they don't make you disassemble your pen to floss the nib and feed. Typically, the more intensely saturated the color is, the greater are the dye load and the concomitant risk of clogging. "

Private Reserve (and Noodler's) are inks that are intensely saturated. I use a lot of Noodler's inks, and have found that diluting them with water can be helpful.

But I also wonder about how this problem came to be. Keith mentioned that he has been using the pen for several years, but the problem materialized when he started using the Private Reserve cartridges. Was the pen flushed before switching inks? There is a science involved in mixing inks - some combinations work, but others do not, and the only way to know if a combination is OK is to actually do a test. So when switching inks, it's wise to completely flush the pen to avoid mixing problems.

There was a thread on Fountain Pen Maintenance back in January that suddenly reappeared in the index today even through there have not been any posts for 11 months - but it's worth reading because it discusses a lot of the issues that Keith is asking about.
 
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Thanks for the input guys
I have been using Private reserve inks all along - didn't just switch to then. I cleaned the pen using JB Flush but the last pack of cartridges - same color I have used for two years - now seems to be clogging up the word. I will disassemble and clean it well and try again! Thanks for the insights - will update !
 
I stopped using Private Reserve a couple of years ago, because I was having problems with quality consistency.
After a couple of complaints from clients, I switched to J. Herbin.
 
Keith

It may be that you have either a bad batch of ink, or cartridges containing ink that is different from the ink you have been using and that is compatible in some way. I mentioned in my first post that Private Reserve has been struggling. The actual chemical formulas for the original inks were lost when the founder of the company died; its my understanding that inks sold in the last three or four years by the more recent owner were actually produced by a vendor and might have been based on different chemistry. And now the new owner has passed away and the business has been sold to Monteverde who have their own chemists.

Obviously, the first step should be to do a thorough cleaning of the pen to eliminate any problems that may result from the uncertainties associated with ink.

But then, given that Private Reserve is no longer in business, the time may have come to switch to another brand of cartridge. Darrin mentioned J. Herbin - that's a good brand, as is Monteverde (who bought the rights to produce Private Reserve inks earlier this year), Pelikan, Diamine and Visconti, all of whom produce 'international standard short' cartridges. Starting fresh with a different brand of cartridge in a pen that has been thoroughly cleaned should eliminate ink-related problems. If the problem persists, then you probably need to find a nibmeister look for a feed or nib tuning problem.

And if you are prepared for a more dramatic change, you could switch to a converter. That would open the door to a much broader selection of inks including options from manufacturers who only produce proprietary cartridges that won't fit your pen.
 
Thanks for the update Louie!
I have thought about using converters but I feel like they do give a tight fit, you would be back flushing your nib and feed every time you changed inks etc. I am open to hearing how great they are but my perception is that convertors would be kind of a hassle? Please correct me if I am wrong!!!
 
keithbyrd said:
Thanks for the update Louie!
I have thought about using converters but I feel like they do give a tight fit, you would be back flushing your nib and feed every time you changed inks etc. I am open to hearing how great they are but my perception is that convertors would be kind of a hassle? Please correct me if I am wrong!!!
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Switching between different inks, can be a bit of a pain. I don't change brands or colours every time, just when the urge strikes me.

Converters are a little more of a pain, than just plugging in a new cartridge. However, ink in a bottle is way cheaper than cartridge. I also know people, that refill their cartridges using a syringe.
 
keithbyrd said:
Thanks for the update Louie!
I have thought about using converters but I feel like they do give a tight fit, you would be back flushing your nib and feed every time you changed inks etc. I am open to hearing how great they are but my perception is that convertors would be kind of a hassle? Please correct me if I am wrong!!!
Click to expand...
Keith -

I've been using fountain pens exclusively for more than 30 years, and for most of that time, I've used converters. In fact, of the pens that are currently on my desk, inked and ready to go, only one has a cartridge, and it's a special case (it's body is too short to accommodate a converter). So admittedly I bring a strong prejudice to this issue.

In my mind, the main advantage of cartridges is that if you are traveling, cartridges are far more transportable than bottles of ink. Before I retired, I traveled extensively for work, and a trip that lasted more than a week inevitably became a problem because of the risk that a single converter wouldn't hold enough ink, and shlepping a bottle of ink is a real PITA, especially with suspicious airline security people. My solution was to take several pens, but that also caused the security screeners to wonder about me. Of course, my wife wonders about me also, but that's another matter.

If you are simply refilling the converter, you have a choice of leaving it attached to the nib/feed and drawing the new ink through those components, or else removing the converter and filling it directly. Most people draw the fresh ink through the nib/feed. There are three reasons for this. One is that drawing fresh ink through the nib/feed assures that they are primed with ink and ready to start writing immediately. Another is that drawing fresh ink through the feed will dissolve any dried ink inside the feed. Thirdly, on most pens, the fit between a converter and the pen section is a friction fit (there are a few pens that use screw-on converters), and frequently removing it increases the risk that it could become damaged and need to be replaced. Unless you are changing color or ink, there is no need to flush everything with water as part of every refill, especially if you write a lot and have to refill frequently. That said, its not a bad idea to do an actual flush with plain water every three or four refills.

If you are actually changing ink, you definitely want to flush the nib and feed regardless of whether you are using a cartridge or a converter. This is true if you are changing colors (some fountain pen uses intentionally mix inks, but that's an arcane science, not something you want to do inadvertently as part of a refill), and its critical if you are switching to a different kind of ink that might be incompatible with the ink you have been using. In fact, a converter makes that easy because, as it's alternate name implies, it can function as a pump to force clean water through the nib and feed. If you don't have a converter, you either have to soak the nib and feed in water, or else use a pipette or ear syringe to force plain water through those components.
 
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