Which Refills Resist Check Washing or Bleeding?

[penicillin]

Sometimes (rarely) I have to write paper checks. If I want to use my own pens, which refills are the best for writing those checks?

I would like to find refills that resist check washing with chemical solvents (e.g., acetone, mineral spirits, MEK, etc.) as well as not bleeding from water or spilled coffee. Here are some refills I have on hand, all in black color:

• Cross Ball-Point 8514 (Cross type)
• Parker Quink Gel (Parker type)
• Schmidt EasyFLOW 9000 (Parker type)
• Schmidt 5888 (Rollerball)

-> Which would you choose?

I also have some old commercial pens still around, from before I started making (and preferring) my own:

• Lamy Swift (capless rollerball with LAMY M66 refill)
• Fisher Space Pen
• Uniball Vision Exact
• cheap giveaway pens, etc.

 

[Curly]

The Uniball 207 refill was billed as an anti check washing refill. It fit in the old style Sierra Click without the metal extension that kit came with. Roughly 1/2" longer than a standard Parker refill. If you have the old bushing and tube list it would have the tube lengths and you could compare the two (maybe Wayne could dig the info up) and then make any click pen you like that much longer to use it. The new list and the bushing app don't have it. Not sure if it works in a twist. The other way to get the difference is to get someone with one of the extensions to measure it and that would be how much longer to make the tubes. It is a nice writing refill too.

 

[magpens]

@penicillin, @Curly

I just measured one from an old Sierra Click . . . . 0.504", not counting the skinny nipple that fits into the hole on the end of the "Parker" refill.

That's the length of the wide part.

Including the nipple, the total length is 0.683", so that means the nipple is 0.179" long.

The wide part diameter is 0.230", and the nipple diameter is 0.075".

The key part of the metal extender from the old Sierra Click is the length of 0.504" and diameter of 0.230".
Neither dimension is particularly critical.

 

[Curly]

Thanks Mal. All the OP has to do now is pick a Parker refill kit he likes and cut a tube half an inch longer and the Uniball will drop in. A Luxor long was on my list of pens to do so you've helped me too. Happy New Year!

 

[MRDucks2]

The nurses I made pens for required the Energel LR7-A which is an archival ink. I would that meets the purpose of anti check washing.

 

[magpens]

Thanks Mal. All the OP has to do now is pick a Parker refill kit he likes and cut a tube half an inch longer and the Uniball will drop in. A Luxor long was on my list of pens to do so you've helped me too. Happy New Year!

I'm sure you know this, Pete, but the plastic refill extender in the Luxor is shorter than the old Sierra Click's metal extender I specified above.

For the Luxor extender, the important length is 0.298" (diam. 0.220")

 

[Curly]

I'm sure you know this, Pete, but the plastic refill extender in the Luxor is shorter than the old Sierra Click's metal extender I specified above.

For the Luxor extender, the important length is 0.298" (diam. 0.220")

Thanks for the reminder Mal. That means a Luxor Long only needs to be 0.206 longer than a stock tube.

 

[magpens]

Thanks for the reminder Mal. That means a Luxor Long only needs to be 0.206 longer than a stock tube.

Still depends on the length of your refill. . . Your increase in length of 0.206" would then match the Luxor tube to a Uniball 207's length it seems.

I believe I have the old "bushings and tubes" list . . . can send to you if you want it.

Pretty sure that the old Sierra Click tube was 2.42" long

 

[Curly]

Thanks Mal I think we have one in a binder someplace downstairs. I think the 2.42" dimension was for a twist. The Luxor is the only one I want to put a Uniball into so I'm set.

 

[magpens]

@Curly

I just checked the old "bushings and tubes" table, Pete.
The old "Sierra Twist" tube has a length of 2.21", while the old "Sierra Button Click" tube length is 2.42" in that old table, as I said.

I believe Berea did make a change to the "Sierra Button Click" geometry (to avoid the use of the metal extender ?).
Things got confusing at that point because they did not rename the pen kit and did not even make a big deal about the new geometry.

And then . . . they introduced the "Sierra Super Button Click" just a couple or three years ago to make use of the Schmidt SKM-88 clicker.
At least they added the word "Super" !

So . . . trying to follow the developments of Berea's "Button" click pens can lead us all into confusion.

And then there are the "Elegant Sierra" and the "Sierra Elegant Beauty" variants with still different tube lengths.

I don't know the brass tube lengths other than the lengths given in the second sentence of this post (immediately above).
I was a newbie pen turner about 12 years ago and struggled with those two numbers plus the metal refill extender for the Click at that time.
Also, I was a big fan of the Berea products because I bought my first kits from Lee Valley which sells Berea kits exclusively, incl. Sierras.

Strange as it may seem, Lee Valley has not yet started to offer the "Sierra SUPER Button Click", in spite of my requests to do so ! ! ! !

 

[monophoto]

There was a time when the concern about 'check washing' was something to worry about. Today, however, we make most payments electronically, and have the number of actual paper checks to probably 20% of what it was ten years ago. So the risk of a check being compromised is much lower than it used to be.

But for fountain pen people like me, there are a number of ways to address this issue if you are still concerned. Nathan Tardif, the guy behind Noodler's Inks, is a bit hyper on this subject, and has developed several inks that are specifically designed to prevent someone from tampering with checks or other critical documents. One of the earliest is his Bulletproof Black that contains components that chemically bond with the cellulose fibers in paper. At one point, he issued a challenge to award a price to anyone who could find a way to erase something written in that ink without also destroying the paper it was written on - that prize was eventually claimed by a grad student at MIT who developed a technique that involved exotic lasers. That led Nathan to develop another line of inks (called the "Warden series" and that includes things like Bad Blue Heron, Bad Belted Kingfisher, and Bad Back Moccasin).

I have not used any of the 'Bad' inks, but one of my daily-carry pens is filled with Bulletproof Black that I use for situations where I'm concerned about security. Bulletproof Black is so saturated/intense that it can smear even when fully dried (on less absorbent papers) Like most people who use it, I dilute it with a little water to prevent smearing.

 

[penicillin]

What brought this on was that I was writing checks to put in the mail. I put a check down on an unseen wet coffee spot. The ink on the check started to bleed. It has been raining very steady here for many days, and I became concerned that the letters might get wet and bleed in a way to make the letters undeliverable or ruin the checks inside. In case anyone cares, I was using a LAMY Swift rollerball pen.

The incident reminded me of a coworker who had outbound checks stolen from her mailbox and washed. It happened many years ago. The thieves used one of the checks to pay their electric bill. They were so dumb that they wrote their account number on the check. After identifying the account and getting a search warrant, the police found trays, solvents, etc. in the thieves' home.

I am still looking for ordinary Parker and standard rollerball refills that resist casual attempts at washing checks with ordinary household chemicals and solvents. My threat model does not include MIT grad students with high tech lasers or well-funded professional laboratories. (... although I must admit that I found @monophoto's post fascinating).

 

[monophoto]

What brought this on was that I was writing checks to put in the mail. I put a check down on an unseen wet coffee spot. The ink on the check started to bleed. It has been raining very steady here for many days, and I became concerned that the letters might get wet and bleed in a way to make the letters undeliverable or ruin the checks inside.

That's something I relate to.

My HP printer uses inks that are water soluble (except of course when they get on clothing). I just wrote the check for our annual town property tax (always the first check of a new year), and is my standard practice, I printed a mailing label from my computer since that is always more legible than my handwriting. After attaching it to the envelop, I then put a layer of thin packing tape over the label to protect it from rain or snow and minimize the risk that it might get misdirected.

Roller ball inks are water based, and as far as I know, they will all bleed if exposed to water. The same is true of gel pen inks. Conventional ball point inks are made using non-soluble oils, so they will be far more resistant to incidental moisture. However, incidental moisture from spilled coffee, rain or snow is quite different from intentional attempts to wash the ink.

Solvent-based inks such as a Sharpie will be even more secure because they bond with the fibers in the paper. But I've had experiences with Sharpies in my shop that clearly show that writing can be washed with a solvent like acetone, so I suspect that would be true on paper.

 

[Woodchipper]

I have used all kinds of pens with mostly Parker refills. Never had a problem.
BTW, I write checks for all my bills. Only have one that is on automatic pay.

 

[Curly]

Here is an old youtube flick about check washing and the Uniball ink.

 

[penicillin]

Here is an old youtube flick about check washing and the Uniball ink.
(See video, above.)

Thanks for posting the video. That is the kind of homebrew check washing I would like to avoid. I would like to find Parker-size and Rollerball-size refills for my own pens made from common pen kits with inks that resist that type of check washing.

I do have a comment about the video. I hope the presenter is using checks from an account that is closed. You can clearly see the name, address, and MICR code (routing and account numbers) for the account associated with the checks he used for the demo. It is not a very good demo if you are trying to teach others about security, huh?

 

[Curly]

Thanks for posting the video. That is the kind of homebrew check washing I would like to avoid. I would like to find Parker-size and Rollerball-size refills for my own pens made from common pen kits with inks that resist that type of check washing.

I do have a comment about the video. I hope the presenter is using checks from an account that is closed. You can clearly see the name, address, and MICR code (routing and account numbers) for the account associated with the checks he used for the demo. It is not a very good demo if you are trying to teach others about security, huh?

Since the video is about 12 years old I don't think he has much to worry about now but then perhaps. I thought it rather dumb to dip his hands in the Acetone without gloves but I can't say I didn't do a lot worse years ago. As far as I know there are no refills among the usual suspects that can't be washed so if you experiment and find some please put them up.

 

[penicillin]

Yeah, I noticed the acetone too. That a safety issue to be sure, but not a security issue. Most of my accounts have had the same account number for way longer than 12 years. You would measure the time I have had them in decades.