Fountain Pen Repair

Fountain Pen Repair

Bertram's Inkwell can repair most pens from just about any era. For vintage pens (those no longer supported by the manufacturer) we offer repair service from our in-house repair tech, to local and national repair experts. We offer services from fountain pen sac replacement to parts repair and replacement/re-manufacturing. Bertram's Inkwell attends pen shows across the country so we have the ability to get parts no other repair centers have access to.

Bertram's Inkwell is proud to have one of the top vintage pen repair specialists in the country to handle your vintage pen.

Current pens: those still in production can also be repaired. Whether you bought your pen from Bertram's Inkwell or another dealer, it makes no difference. We are glad to repair any pen brought in or sent to us.

Fountain Pens: can sometimes need a general cleaning. This is one of our more popular services since we can perform most cleanings in-house with a turn around of (usually) less than a week.

Charges:  Can and do vary for all types of repairs.  We will contact you when complete. Please do not send any payment or credit card information in with your pen(s).

Packaging: Please pack your pen(s) in a hard box - no padded envelopes. This will protect your pen in transit to us. Please do not send the original packaging/gift box that the pen came in. Make sure to include the following information in the package.

Name:
Address:
Phone:
Email:
Pen brand:
Type: Fountain, Ballpoint, Rollerball, Pencil. etc.
General description of work needed.

Please send your repair to the following address:

Bertram's Inkwell
Attn: Pen Repair Fulfillment Center
11520-E Rockville Pike
Rockville, MD 20852

We will contact you upon completion of the repair once it's ready to go back to you.

Customized Select Pen Repair:

We are the premier Parker dealer that has the capability of fixing older Parker Duofold gold-capped ballpoint pens. We have the twist mechanism that Parker no longer carries, and the capability to repair/overhaul broken mechanisms.

We also have the capability of fixing/overhauling Sheaffer Snorkels

Nib Repair

If nib repair is an issue for your fountain pens, look no further.

We offer the following service:

If your nib is bent or mis-aligned we have custom services available to bring your nib back to life.

If your nib is too wide, we have expert nib grinders trained under the world's best to grind your nib to the point size you prefer (generally it would be reductions only)

Tired of writing with the same old nib? Have it ground to a customized italic, stub, or oblique, sized to your specifications.

As always, folks have plenty of questions, and we are here to help! So please, do not hesitate to contact us with your questions.

Email:
info@bertramsinkwell.com

Phone:
301-770-PENS

Custom Nib Grinds:  Introduction by Jack

I've had a lot of fun working as the repair tech for Bertram's Inkwell. I've already fixed
so many pens in my time working for Bert, but as much as I enjoy restoring pens to good
working order, I still think there's something much more fun than any repair could ever
be. By now you may be wondering what could possibly be more fun than scraping out a
disintegrated rubber sac from a vintage pen. Well, dearest pen friends, I have an answer
for you: custom grinds.
"That's great," most people say, "but what is a custom grind?" The answer is deceivingly
simple. A custom grind is any sort of modification to the shape of a nib's tipping
material that changes the line it puts down on the page. (Translation: different grinds
make different lines!)
Before I get too ahead of myself about what kinds of grinds there are, I should explain
how a normal nib works. The little ball of stuff at the end of your nib (sometimes called
iridium) is a super-hard metal, almost as hard as the surface of a diamond in some
cases. For your pen to write smoothly that little ball has to be, well, ball-shaped, or in
technical terms, 'round'. If your nib is not round it will feel 'scratchy' at some angles on
the page. In the case of custom grinds, however, a nib is not rounded at some angles on
purpose, changing the writing experience of a nib in surprisingly pleasant ways.
For example, a common nib offered by many large pen manufacturers nowadays is a
'stub' nib. The stub nib is the easiest example of a nib with line variation, which just
means that when the pen is held a certain way it can produce thicker or thinner lines on
the page.
A stub grind usually means that vertical lines are wider than horizontal lines on paper.
There are all sorts of other fun custom grinds, too; my favorite one, the 'architect's nib',
is sort of like a stub that's been turned 90º against the page, which is to say that its
vertical lines are quite thin while its horizontal lines are quite thick.
As the repair tech at Bertram's Inkwell I am pleased to say that I am capable of grinding
nibs to customer specifications! If you'd like to add some unique flair to your
handwriting, aren't happy with your current pen's nib, or just want something fun to try,
I'm more than happy to help you through the process. Alternatively, if you have a nib
that just doesn't write quite right, I can tune it to be perfectly smooth for your hand as
well as adjust and optimize inkflow to your preferences.
I've barely just scratched the surface of the wonderful world of nibs in this post, so if
you'd like more information feel free to stop by and ask questions or email me at
jack@bertramsinkwell.com! Keep writing, folks- the pen is truly mightier than the
sword! Plus it's not as much of a pain to carry around.