Indy-Pen-Dance Reference Pages

What Do These Symbols Mean?

Basic Pen Care
How To Clean Your Fountain Pen
How To Ship Your Fountain Pen
Preserving Your Pens: Do's and Don’ts
Nib Tuning for Beginners

Reference
Basic Grinds Explained
Linda's Full Flex Nib Reviewed
Richard's Stroke Width Chart
Creating a Personal Writing Experience
Fountain Pen Sac Size Guide
Pelikan Nib Interchangeability Chart
Changing Screw-in Nib Units
Inks: The good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Inks: Report on the pH of More than 60 Inks
Flex, a Disaster in the Making
Sheaffer Snorkel Identification Guide

Musings From The Bench
May 2021
  Linda discusses what can happen to fountain pens with India ink.
Mike shows how an oxidized hard rubber pen can be saved.
Tip: Clearing out Snorkel tube clogs.
April 2021
  Linda discusses the effects of poor pen hygiene on steel nibs.
Mike offers tips when the right size o-ring isn't available.
Tip: Getting control of ultrasonic temperature.
March 2021
   Linda discusses nib aligning with the inexperienced.
   Mike showcases the Sheaffer Honors Masterpiece restoration.
September 2020
  Linda debunks the "brown paper sack" smoothing method.
Mike repairs Ink-Vue retaining ring.
Tip: Cleaning imprints and blind cap flutes.
Mailbag: How often to clean your fountain pen.
August 2020
  Linda straightens out writer with too much feedback.
Mike explains why paper shims are not a good idea.
Tip: Not all buff sticks are the same.

Pen Comparisons
Fountain Pen Vital Statistics
Bexley Pen Comparison
Edison Pen Comarison
Gate City Pen Comparison
Pelikan Pen Comparison
Pilot/Namiki Pen Comparison

Pen Reviews
Linda's Full Flex Nib Review
New Postal Reservoir

Restoration Tips & Tricks
Vac-fill Testing
Fixing Clogged Sheaffer Balance Feeds
Flossing A Sheaffer Snorkel Tube
Aurora 88 Piston Repair
Preserving Your Pens: Do's and Don’ts
Nib Tuning for Beginners

Assorted Articles
What is Fountain Pen Friendly Ink?
Guide to Buying Restored Fountain Pens on eBay
Are Modern Pens As Good As Old Ones?

History and Pens
U.S. Pen Manufacturers Database
American Stationer Index
Bookseller & Stationer Index
Geyer's Stationer Index
Jewelers’ Circular and Horological Review
New England Stationer and Printer Index
Walden's Stationer and Printer Index

The Governor Roberts Pen
The Lennard Taylor Pen
The James A. Malarkey Pen

Articles From Richard Binder
We want you to have access to the best available information and instructions. Instead of
re-writing what Richard has already perfected, we will connect you directly to his articles.

Pen Model Profiles

Repairer's Corner
We always encourage our clients to work on their own pens when they have the skillset and the desire to do so. Instead of reinventing the whee,l so to speak, here are links directly to Richard's website (with permission) for his carefully complied articles on specific pen repairs.

The Technical Stuff
Return Policy
Shipping Policy

Recommended Reading

Richard Binder Books

You can read the Kindle or Nook versions of Richard's books on your Android device, your iPhone, or your iPad Touch with the appropriate free app.

New! The RichardsPens Guide to Fountain Pens
Volume 1: Glossopedia (FIfth Edition)

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

The Glossopedia is a compact glossary/mini-encyclopedia of definitions and descriptions for more than 1,600 individual entries comprising (with subentries) more than 1,750 individual terms, featuring more than 1,000 full-color illustrations, more than 200 patent citations linked to their respective patent documents at various archives, and extensive cross-references. It’s an indispensable reference.

Japanese Pocket Pens (Second Edition)

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app (日本のお客様はamazon.co.jpへの直接リンク)
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

The world’s first publication devoted to Japanese pocket pens!

In the early 1960s, the space race and Hideo Shima’s radical new bullet train, perhaps leavened by the futuristic American automotive stylings of Harley Earl, spawned great changes in the Japanese aesthetic, and a new type of fountain pen burst onto the market. Called “pocket pens,” these pens appeared in myriad trim variations under dozens of manufacturers’ names. Their unifying characteristic was an extraordinarily long gripping section mated with a very stubby barrel.

This book touches on the “Big Three,” Sailor, Platinum, and Pilot, following them with a gaggle of lesser brands. The discussion then turns to design features that were common to many brands (e.g., pens decorated with botanical or similar designs). Appendixes contain several types of information to assist the reader in identifying pocket pens.

This expanded edition includes more than 75 added pens, additional text, and updated information based on new discoveries.

Fountain Pen Profiles: Parker

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

George Safford Parker was born in Shullsburg, Wisconsin, in 1863. In the mid-1880s, as a young man, George himself settled in Janesville, Wisconsin, and began teaching a course in the growing field of telegraphy. To supplement his income, he took on a job retailing fountain pens; but he soon became disillusioned by the unreliability of the pens of the time, especially the ones he himself was selling. He took it upon himself to find a way to prevent, or at least work around, the problems he saw, and in 1888, he filed for his first patent. Not content to sit around waiting for his ship to come in, he was busily thinking up ways to make his pens better, and he never stopped improving his pens. The Parker Pen Company continues today with the development and production of fine writing instruments. This book is the story of some of Parker's most notable models through the decades.

Fountain Pen Profiles: L. E. & A. A. Waterman

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

Lewis Edson Waterman was a life insurance salesman. When his new fountain pen threw a blot and ruined a contract, he was moved to invent a fountain pen that would not throw blots, and that was the beginning of the L. E. Waterman Company. True? Or not? (It's not.) Arthur Allan Waterman worked as a traveling salesman for the L. E. Waterman Company for 12 years and then left to start his own pen company. After that, Lewis Waterman and his son Frank both hated Arthur. (That's true.) In this full color, generously illustrated book are profiles of nine pivotal L. E. Waterman fountain pen models from 1917 to 1957, together with a long look at A. A. Waterman's history and pens. Blend in a dash of litigation and some shady (really?) dealings by partners, and you end up with lots of great information and a lively view of business back in the olden days.

Fountain Pen Profiles: Wahl-Eversharp

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app
Printed, deluxe full-color paperback (6"×9")

The world of fountain pens is a big place, with room for everyone who wants to collect or use them, or both. This book is a look at a small part of that world, a “country,” so to speak, where once upon a time there were created many beautiful and functional pens. That country, the Wahl Company, came into the pen world through violence, in a way, by applying economic pressure to a smaller, weaker country whose resource, the Eversharp pencil, it wanted for its own—and took, in 1916. In this full color, generously illustrated book are profiles of eleven Wahl-Eversharp fountain pen models, from the beginning to the end in 1957, when that covetous country passed into history as it was in turn taken over by a yet bigger, more powerful neighbor.

Personalized Pens: History in Your Hand

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

Pen collecting is a wonderful hobby, but when it comes right down to it, isn’t it really about meeting people with whom you share a common interest? Here, in the form of personalized pens, are several very real people with whom I share a common appreciation for pens (and, in some cases, other common interests). All of these people, or the people who loved them, cared enough about their pens to have the pens personalized, forever to be linked to their first owners. This book contains sketches of the lives of 15 people, some of whom did great things and others who did not. All of them were ordinary people, living (mostly) ordinary lives, who happened to own pens on which their names were engraved (or scratched). Each of them has a history that deserves to be preserved and remembered.

The Best of the Pen Doctor

Are your fountain pens feeling and performing at their best? If they're not, here is the intervention they — and you — need to perk them up and whip them into shape. From a leaking Vacumatic to a Snorkel whose feed has fallen out, from stuck caps to levers that rattle, from blots after filling to nibs that stop writing halfway down the page, the professional tips and techniques in these pages have been written in answer to questions from real people like you, and they can help you reignite the joy of collecting fountain pens and writing with them.

cover

The RichardsPens Guide to Fountain Pens
Volume 2: Restoration

This book is an adjunct to the two excellent existing repair manuals, Marshall/Oldfield and Da Book. It contains material that is often very specific to a particular pen or type of pen, but much of its information can also be applied generally to other pens. Learn what is here, extrapolate from it, and apply your new knowledge to the needs of the pen in your hands at any given moment.

We’re offering a premium full-color perfect-bound paperback through Amazon.com. The inside margin is extra wide so that you can have it punched and put into a 3-ring binder. Or if you’d prefer a larger format that will lie flat on your repair bench, we've arranged with another vendor to supply a special coil-bound edition, as well.

The RichardsPens Guide to Fountain Pens
Volume 3: Filling Systems

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

In this companion book to my RichardsPens Guide to Fountain Pens, Volume 2: Restoration, I catalog virtually every filling system I’ve encountered, encompassing most fountain pens from the late 1800s to the present. This volume not only outlines the history of fountain pen filling systems from the early days to the 21st century, it also also gives in-depth directions on how to fill these classic pens yourself. Like a friendly neighbor down the street, I give you a step-by-step for all of them. It's like having a veteran fountain pen expert at your side. Illustrated with patent drawings and never-before-seen full-color pictures that explain the behind-the-scenes story of filling system development, this definitive text will serve generations to come.

The RichardsPens Guide to Fountain Pens
Volume 4: Learning About Pens

Kindle format for Amazon Kindle and Kindle app
ePub format for Apple Books on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Mac
ePub format for Barnes & Noble NOOK and NOOK app

In my years of collecting and restoring fountain pens, I’ve become pretty well known for my writings on fountain pen history and repair techniques. In this volume, I’m dishing up a goodly serving of information about various aspects of understanding, collecting, and enjoying pens. Beginning collectors and veterans alike will learn something new and exciting about their hobby.

366 Days of World War II

World War II lasted six years. That’s 2,194 days. What happened in those six years? In this “diary,” I take a different approach to telling the story of the worst conflict humanity has ever experienced. Instead of trying to cover everything, I relate the happenings of just 366 days, the length of a single year. Choosing events great and small from the beginning of the war to its bitter end, I give you a fascinating and sometimes shocking look at things you know from your high-school history and things you may never have heard of. Ebook versions include 6 photos, printed version includes 45 photos.

The Curmudgeon’s Dictionary, by Simon Gruff

This book shouldn’t really be on this page; but since I’ve taken down my other book pages, it has to go here. (I’ve gone around and found all the links to save you the time.)

The author says he took his inspiration from the Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. You don’t have to agree with everything he sticks his voodoo pins into, and he’s somewhat less than politically correct, but he sometimes hits the nail right on the head — and even when he’s wrong, he can be pretty funny.

Reference Pages

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Reference Pages

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