Restoring an Esterbrook SJ

At the 2017 D.C. Pen Show I passed some tables with pen repair tools. I had never though about pen repair/restoration before, but the idea intrigued me.

After watching several YouTube videos and reading about how to get started I was ready to give it a shot. I just needed a pen to restore. The general consensus is to start with a lever filler because they are fairly simple. I had read that Esterbrooks are a good one to start with so off to eBay I went where I acquired a black Esterbook SJ.

As you can see below, the pen needed some work.

The first thing I did was soak the nib and section in water for several hours. After the soak, it was easy to unscrew the nib from the section. Next, grabbing the section and barrel firmly I was able to separate them using a slow twisting motion. Now for the fun part, removing the dried sac.

By tapping the barrel gently on a hard surface I was able to get quite a bit of it out. I didn’t have any scrappers or dental pics so I used a wooden chopstick with a fine point to loosen pieces of the sac that were stuck to the inside. I used a cotton swab to grab any small loose particles and then finished up with a few puffs from a can of compressed air.

Now it was time to replace the sac. I used a pocket knife to remove the remaining bits of the sac on the sac nipple. I then smoothed the surface using a sheet of micro mesh. A dab of sac shellac secured the replacement sac.

While waiting for the shellac to dry I turned my attention to the body of the pen. I first buffed the outside using a polishing pad, followed by a second round of polish and buff using Simichrome polish. The section, barrel, and cap cleaned up easily, but the nib needed some extra attention.

I soaked the nib again in water and a small drop of dish soap. I took a soft bristle toothbrush and cut the bristles in half to make it slightly stiffer. Using the toothbrush I was able to remove most of the gunk from the nib. I used a polishing pad to clean up the rest of it.

Overall the pen cleaned up nicely and I am happy with how it turned out.