FrankenVac

This thing turned up in a lot some time ago. I looked at it, felt somewhat puzzled and set it aside. Coming back to it today, all I have added to it are a nib I had lying around and a pressure bar. Otherwise it’s as it came to me. I’m not very happy with the section which doesn’t seem right. Apart from that, what is it? The barrel says it’s a Vacumatic but it’s a button filler. The average amateur couldn’t make that conversion. Any thoughts on the matter? Lots of photographs to let you see what it is.

16 thoughts on “FrankenVac

  1. Hello,

    I am growing frustrated from your website: I cannot see any picture whatever; I cannot post any comment. If I click on your unsubscribe link, I end on an unavailable page (see my screen capture). As I don’t see much point in being subrscribed to such a mutilated website, I kindly ask you to unsubscribe me manually (pm@admil.com ).

    Thanks in advance and kind regards,

    Piero Mattirolo

    >

    1. First of all, I don’t see any screenshot. Secondly, others are not reporting the same problem so perhaps this is a YOU problem. If you don’t like the site, don’t come here.

      1. Sorry, I just discovered your replies over a year later. It seems That my malfunctioning is due to my router settings that seem to block all sites under wordpress.com. When I am connected through my 4G card, no problems arise

  2. am sorry that Piero is having problems – I hope it’s a temporary glitch.

    There seems no doubt that the pen is Canadian – the high up blue diamond – the large date digit (for what is possibly 1943) – might the pen is a Major – how long is the pen Deborah?
    Is there a Reg. No. on the cap tassie? The notchless feed could be a tad suspect and not original.
    As to the missing Vac. components, my wild suggestion is that possibly the captive plastic plunger and unit have been removed, and substituted with a Duofold b.f. unit – these units are removable – though whether Duofold replacements will fit the Vac. threading, again I’m really flying a kite. There seems to be some suggestion that with the plastic plunger, there are potential breakage issues when removing, so maybe someone had just that problem and simplified the repair by using a Duofold b.f. replacement.
    And next week how to nail jelly to the ceiling:-)

    1. The barrel is 6.8cm not counting the button housing. No number on the tassie. I think the feed is wrong and I’m looking for something better. Are Duofold button housings threaded? It’s all very interesting!

  3. No, the blue diamond says it is a top of the range pen. More likely a franken Vac. The button is about 1 mm narrower than the plunger, so it would probably fit into the vac housing. If a sac was fitted a new section would be needed for the nose to fit it and the feed is wrong, it should be toothed. I thought Parker used brass buttons, but I could be wrong.

  4. from looking at my few Duofolds it appears they did – but since this thing is such a mongrel, then a chromed button might have been sourced from anywhere. When you say plunger, Peter, do you mean a lock down, or the plastic sort?

  5. :-):-) sorry for maligning a genuine frankenVac.

    You’re right about the difference in size Peter – in fact I’d suggest it could be a little more than the 1mm you mention.

    Re the other query of Deborah’s as to whether Duofold button housings are removable ………
    I could be wrong but it does appear the answer is no – they look to be integral with the barrel and machined/threaded simply as part of a single piece barrel.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.