Editing The Pen Addict 363/transcript (section)

== Pen Explosions/Leaks ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. So, next up, we have a question from Bump who says, What is the worst place you ever had a pen explode or leak ink? And do you have any tips for getting gel ink out of clothes and the inside of a dryer?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' This is a brutal tweet I got from our friend Bump a couple weeks ago. And so, I put out a call for help on Twitter. And the best thing I can tell you is people have lots of suggestions for this. So, it's threaded. We'll add a link into the show notes. And this happens more than you think. So, people have solutions for this. I don't know how many replies or responses I got to this. But it was a lot. And there's some great ideas. So, you should take a look and keep this link handy in case this ever happens to you. I know, Myke, we should probably keep this link handy for when it happens again. Because we'll get this question again for sure. I just didn't have a definitive answer to give Bump to do this. So, I wanted to put it out there to the wisdom of the crowd. And they delivered, man. Big time.

'''Myke Hurley:''' The only thing that I can ever think of that happened to me was when I was buying your Vacumatic. And I pulled the lever on the table. And it was full of ink. Yeah. That was cool. It was an experience for everybody involved.

'''Myke Hurley:''' And a story you can always tell. Evan asks, when you use a cartridge or converter pen with a converter, do you attach the converter to the section and fill through the nib in the feed? Or do you fill the converter first and attach the section afterwards? This is a fantastic question. I think this is like an ideology thing.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' It is. But it also relates to like the beginner thing. And it also relates to how particular you are thing. So, let's actually just answer this question.

'''Myke Hurley:''' What do you do?

'''Myke Hurley:''' Both. Of course I knew you were going to say that. I put the converter in and fill through the nib in the feed. That's what I always do.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That's the preferred way to do it. The reasons I will not do that is if I feel the pen, I do not want to get as much ink onto the pen. Like it's not a basic plastic. I understand that.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Like if you have some kind of material that you feel may be affected by being dipped into ink. I get that. I totally understand that.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And generally, that's not an issue, right? But like I don't fill my Nakayas that way. I will syringe fill.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Interesting.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Even though I could and it would be fine, I syringe fill a converter and then pop the converter into the pen. And even though it's going to take it longer, I start writing. I mean, I just. Big fancy boy.

'''Myke Hurley:''' You're like, oh, I'm going to fill my Nakayas with a syringe.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I'm particular, not necessarily because of like damage to the pen, which you really can't do, but of cleanliness and that type of thing.

'''Myke Hurley:''' I fill my kings of pens normally as I always do.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I fill my king of pens that way. Okay. Yeah. Like I, although those are difficult because the nib is so large. That is true. You have to have a deep, deep ink well.

'''Myke Hurley:''' You have to have a lot of ink left in the bottle to be able to fill one of those things. Thirsty.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So the particular pen Evan discussed is one I just bought, the Franklin Kristoff 31. It has a recessed nib, right? So like the nib is kind of half covered by the barrel exterior, right? Do you know what I mean when I say that? It's got a little collar. So yeah, it's got like this extra collar on the exterior. So that ink gets up in there. Like that would bug me, right? That's an annoyance to me. So with that pen, I would choose, I would choose to fill it just, you know, sticking the converter in the ink bottle and filling it that way or whatever. Like I just don't like, I don't like the mess if I have an easy enough option to not have it. So that's my thoughts. But this is also like I bring this, I include this question for a lot of reasons. Like this is also like a beginner 101 question. Like some people just don't know how to do this, right? What do I do with these parts to make them work, right? Well, generally you stick the converter empty on the nib unit, stick the nib unit down into the ink and then twist the converter to pull up the ink and then clean off the nib with a paper towel or something like that. Like these are the things like sometimes we forget we need to discuss these things from time to time, which is why I enjoyed this question so much.