Tips To Clean Your Fountain Pen Properly

by Shailendra Kadulkar Web Development & SEO

Tips To Clean Your Fountain Pen Properly

Indeed, writing with a fountain pen is something really pleasurable. After all, the effortless, free flow is always appreciable. However, proper maintenance is equally important to keep up your fountain pens writing well. Beginners are often not sure about the right way of cleaning up their fountain pens. This is, however, going to be all about that.

Why clean a fountain pen?

Like any well-tuned machines would need for great performance with fountain pens also need regular and perfect cleaning. Fountain pens are known to rely on capillary actions to function. Dust, fibers, and flakes of dried ink tend to build up and feed over time. This would certainly cause disruption in the capillary action and cause the pen to write poorly. Uneven ink flow, skipping and scratchiness is probably the symptoms that a pen needs cleaning.

How to Clean a Fountain Pen?

Fountain pens generally require cleaning within every 4 to 8 weeks. You can also do this more frequently when you fill ink into your pen. Moreover, some ways to clean a fountain pen perfectly are mentioned below:

Basic Cleaning

Step #1: Disassemble the pen

First, uncap the pen and from the pen’s barrel, remove the nib section. For this, you may need to unscrew the pen from the point where the nib adjoins the barrel. If your fountain pens use converters or cartridge, remove them from the nib section. This will save the ink and make it usable again after cleaning the pen. You may seal the opening of the cartridge using a tape so that the sink does not dry out.

Step #2: Rinse

For proper cleaning, hold the nib section under running water for some time. Any ink that is easily removable will get washed away this way and the next step could be easily carried on. Use only cold water or the one on room temperature for cleaning purposes. Hot water tends to damage certain components of a fountain pen.

Step #3: Soak

Take some clean water in a cup and soak the nib section in it. Replace the water when it gets saturated after some time. This process should be repeated unless the water remains clean for over an hour. Keep in mind that some highly saturated and water resistant inks tend to take longer to clean away properly. There is no major issue with using tap water, however; distilled water would be the Fountain pens best for the purpose since tap water has high contents of minerals.

Step #4: Dry

Now, take away the nib section from water and let it dry properly for about 12 to 24 hours. For the best results leave he nib-down, sitting, wrapped up in a smooth, soft cloth or paper towel to fetch water completely out of the nib.

Step #5: Reassemble the pen

Once the nib section is properly dry, install the cartridge or converter and screw the nib section back to the barrel.

Flushing

When you’re pen is writing poorly, sit is suggestible to flush it before actually filling in ink again. Flushing would certainly mean forcing water into the nib section until it gets cleaned properly. Follow the instructions below:

• Disassemble the fountain pen and rinse it well under running water as done for basic cleaning.

• Now, place the open end of the barrel or converter into a cup full of water. Further, fill and empty the sink chamber. Do this until it gets cleaned properly.

• Reattach the converter or barrel to the nib section and place the nib in a cup full of water.

• Cycle water, in and out of the pen using the built-in filing system or converter. This should be repeated until no more ink is pushed out into the water from the pen. It would be suggestible to replace the water

• Let the nib section soak in water for a few hours so that the remaining ink particles get dissolved and cleaning is properly done.

• Dry the pen properly as done in case of basic cleaning and then reassemble it.

Fountain pen ink cleaner kits

If your pen does not use a built-in filing system or converter or uses any other international standard ink cartridges, you can make use of some efficient fountain pen cleaning kits along with the above-mentioned steps.

Cartridge Syringe Hack

You can also make use of an improvised syringe for cleaning other cartridge pens. For this, you would need to cut off one end of the empty ink cartridge and then fit it to the locking syringe. This syringe would be easily available at any of the drug stores. You may use the cartridge syringe to flush the pen.

Though cleaning a fountain pen is not a very difficult task, the above-mentioned guides and steps would help you to do it perfectly and make the best of your handmade fountain pen.