Recently I purchased a bunch of pen refills to improve some pens I | |
have some 80-90s era IBM pens that just had dried up plastic stick | |
as well as some other more modern pens I like the appearance of, bu | |
crappy refills. | |
First I have some Chinese knock offs of nicer pens that took roller | |
refills. Pilot G2 style refills will also fit so I put an Energel 0 | |
Sarasa Dry 0.5 refill. The Sarasa Dry is impressively dark and whil | |
does dry fast, it has a very wide line for 0.5 and seems splotchy. | |
I also bought a Pilot Multiball rollerball pen to compare to the Pi | |
Precise. It seems okay, the 0.5mm Multiball writes scratchy compare | |
the Precise V5. I guess it has the advantage of being able to write | |
non-porous surfaces. I also bought a Uni Boxy 100 which is very coo | |
pen but the refill that comes with is very poor ballpoint ink. It's | |
very dark and has a lot of resistance. I put a 0.5mm Jetstream mult | |
refill in it. It fit, I just had to add some scotch tape in the rig | |
place as a spring stop. | |
Boxy 100 | |
Now onto the real modifications. I have this cool looking IBM Print | |
Systems Division pen that has a cylinder with text on it and two wi | |
on the outside. Every time you click it rotates through the text. I | |
to put a Hi-Tech-C 0.3 blue multipen refill in it, but had issues g | |
the spring top in the right place and accidentally popped the tip o | |
which messed up the refill and put an air bubble in it, I might be | |
to fix it later, but it will be a messy job. So instead I managed t | |
a Zebra JK 0.7mm ball point refill in it. I had to pop the back cap | |
the refill so it would fit in the tube with the writing and then sh | |
with a lollipop stick it works but it doesn't have a nice feel to | |
IBM printer pen | |
Next I had a fancy looking IBM twist pen that uses cross ball point | |
I didn't like any of the compatible refill choices so I decided to | |
Ohto needletip ballpoint refill that was very close to the correct | |
I had trimmed a few mm off the back of the Ohto refill then moved t | |
cap over from the back of the cross refill to the Ohto. After that | |
discovered the spring stop on the Ohto made it too wide to fit so I | |
those down. Then I found that the upper part of the tip was too wid | |
through the front of the pen so I drill it out a bit and filed it s | |
It works great now and I really like the Ohto needle ballpoint. The | |
are very precise and it lets me write smaller than the Hi-Tech-C 0. | |
with it being 0.5mm. Will certainly always want to have a pen with | |
refill around. | |
IBM twist pen | |
The final of the IBM pens is this one from a charity drive in 1990. | |
the triangle shape to be very comfortable in the hand and I like th | |
and blue colors. I decided to put a 0.4mm Hi-Tech-C multipen refill | |
in it. The spring stop on the new refill was in the right spot, the | |
just needed to be longer. So I cut a piece of dried up stick refill | |
laying around to be the correct length as a spacer. I found when I | |
the clicker the refill and the spacer didn't always align so I join | |
with scotch tape. Works perfect now. Despite liking using the full | |
Hi-Tech-C pens for diagrams I am disappointed with this vs the Ohto | |
needlepoint. Despite being a smaller tip, the line is larger and I | |
write as small. I also do have be careful not to touch the ink aft | |
writing or it will smudge. All this makes sense as it is gel. I pr | |
Ohto although it doesn't come in colors. The Hi-Tech-C is cheaper | |
Ohtos but given Ohto is ballpoint it may last long enough vs this g | |
refill to be worth the extra expense. | |
IBM Charity Pen | |
Last but not least, I decided to change the ink in the two Zebra G- | |
have. I think these pens look great, but I regret getting the G vs | |
series. The gel refills are splotchy and easy to smudge. And I've r | |
don't last long because of their size. I decided to replace these w | |
a black and blue Acroball 0.5mm multipen refills. I have tried 1.0m | |
before and thought it dried too slow, but I do like it in 0.5mm. It | |
ALMOST as smooth as Jetstream. To get them to fit, I had to cut abo | |
off the back and use scotch tape as a spring stop. | |
Zebra G-402s with Acro refills | |
Finally here is a photo of a writing sample with all the "new" pens | |
Writing Sample |