The JINHAO X750 has been much commented on of late and seems to be well received, for the most part. I decided to have a look at one myself and found it was cheap beyond cheap! I bought mine from Amazon for a ridiculous £2.99 and I believe you can find them even cheaper in eBay. Coming from Japan, delivery took about three weeks.

This one is described as the “black, night sky” pattern. It’s quite attractive, with tiny sparkly inserts in the black paint. Some Jinhaos are heavy, others are light. This is one of the former at 38 g. It’s not the heaviest pen around but it’s too heavy for me, particularly posted. It’s quite well-balanced, though. It’s also quite big at 14.3 cm capped.

It has the usual Jinhao metalwork, chrome-plated clip, cap ring and a small accent ring at the base of the barrel. The pen clicks shut and does so very well. Unlike many Chinese pens, it doesn’t take a great effort to separate cap and barrel. Once you’ve done so, you’re presented with a matte black section, a final chrome plated ring and a very large nib. The nib is inscribed with the Jinhao logo of two men in a chariot, the word “Jinhao” and the legend “18 K GP”. The latter, I think is nonsense. Whatever it’s plated with is silver coloured and it certainly isn’t gold, not even white gold. Pull the other one, Jinhao.

When it comes to writing, despite my asking for a fine, I’ve been given a medium, which is not especially to my taste. Allowing for that it writes extremely well. No skipping or hard starting and the line is consistent. I need to try it over a few more days to be absolutely sure that there is no later hard starting but so far I’m very pleased with it.

As I’ve said before, I can’t imagine how they turn out decent, basic pens at this price. Ours not to question why, just take advantage of it if you need a very sturdy, workaday pen. This one even comes with a converter.

Moving on to another subject, these last few days of the run-up to Christmas are a quiet period. Presents have been bought and the money has been spent. I’ve already restocked the sales website and I can get on with other things. I’d been doing manual backups for years and I decided to take a new approach. I bought the Genie Backup Manager so that I could do incremental backups rather than wasting disk space doing them manually as I had been doing. Also, as my previous backup media had run out, I bought 2×1 TB external disks which should last me for a while, even allowing for double backups. In addition, I had been saving my pen photographs in the GIF file type for some reason I have long forgotten. I used the excellent Fast Stone Image Viewer to convert them all to JPG, reducing their size considerably. I am aware of the potential for loss of detail in photos that are opened and closed frequently in the JPG format, but these are for archive and are likely be opened only very infrequently, if at all.

Conway Stewart Dinkies are in a class of their own. The older, rarer ones can fetch a high price but the 550s from the post-war period don’t sell all that well here. I’ve noticed from some of the pen discussion boards that they sell at a higher price overseas, particularly America.

They are jewel-like little pens and pencils. Though they are at the margin of what is comfortable to write with, many are actually tremendous writers, often with some flexibility.

There seems always to have been a place in the market for small pens. Conway Stewart produced the Dandy, which is small but not so small as the Dinkie. Other companies like National Security/Rosemary sold competitive little pens, which may have been made for them by Conway Stewart. Wahl Eversharp produced exceptionally small pen and pencil sets.  Mabie Todd made short versions of their Swans but they have good girth and useful length when posted. Nobody makes quite such small pens today. The Kaweco Sport is short but posted it’s almost a normal sized pen so it isn’t quite comparable to the Dinkie.

So what was that all about? Many of those which have passed through my hands have been gifts from men to women and from parents to daughters. This example has an inscription showing that it is a gift from a husband to his young wife. They seem to have been particularly intended for women, then. In a way, it’s part of the all-pervasive low-level sexism of the time, and seemed to imply that women should have pretty, little versions of normal sized things. Were they intended to be used or were they just for looking at? The Dinkie is perfectly adequate for taking occasional notes but I’m sure that it would induce hand-strain if used to write pages.

I confess that though their usefulness is limited I like the Dinkies. They usually appear as pen and pencil sets in the original, very decorative boxes. They are made to the same high quality as Conway Stewart applied to the larger pens in those days. And, of course, because there is such a variety of them, they are ideal to collect.

Sexism or no, I was delighted when my husband gave me a Dinkie set some years ago. I fluttered my eyelashes and fainted dead away in an appropriately ladylike fashion.

Smartie here. I see that Deb just posted an announcement about the new uploads to the site. I’ve had enough of this charade, quite frankly. Take a look at this:

That’s right. That’s me, having a little lie-down after I clearly did those writing samples for the pens in that box behind me. It’s exhausting being Deb’s assistant, you know. She takes all the credit, always. Do I ever get a mention, beyond a grumbling comment about how I “never help” or “sleep all day”? Never! Sometimes I think I’ll just walk away from it all to see how she copes on her own.

Just to set the record straight, Deb’s not all that great at being my human. Whenever I want to go out the door, she goes to the wrong door, first. The level of crunchies in my dish is rarely up to spec, my water is consistently too wet, and she and Gordon insist on sleeping in my bed at night. What’s an assistant to do?

Honestly folks, some days it’s enough to drive me to drink.

The Schneider company makes all sorts of writing instruments and has a range of inexpensive fountain pens. This one is the Base, probably indicating that it’s the cheapest one, but none of them cost very much. Its full description is the Schneider Glam Boy Cog Wheel, M, Anthracite-Metallic with Motif.  This pen is sometimes compared with the Lamy Safari, but that doesn’t work for me. I can’t use the Safari – it doesn’t suit my hand, whereas I find the Schneider very comfortable. That being the case, we’ll ignore the comparison and just deal with the pen as it is.

It’s quite a big pen at 14.8 cm capped. The girth is quite good as well – take note, arthritis sufferers – and, of course, it has the ergonomic grip. It has a large and splendid chrome plated clip which ends in a curl of metal. When new it has a strip of plastic on the clip which also bears the website address. Top and bottom are finished with sloping plugs.

These pens come in a variety of colours and patterns. This one is rather splendidly decorated with a pattern of cogs and male heads. The barrel even has additional sparkles. Doubtless aimed at the school student market, I expect it’s rather successful. It might not be to all adult tastes but I quite like it. The cap presses into place with a satisfying click. The  nib is quite broad – I don’t mean the tip, which in this case is fine/medium – but the nib itself. It is engraved with a pattern of curving lines and it’s a good writer. After being closed for quite a while the pen starts immediately and delivers a consistent line. It’s very reliable.

This falls into the category of cheap pens; the very cheapest Base is around £12 and this rather more decorative one is a few pounds more. In terms of performance, however, it’s up there with the best of them. Comparably priced Chinese pens often need a little nib work before they work well but this pen delivered right out of the box (not that it had a box!). Time will tell how robust it is but handling it there’s every reason to believe it will last well. If you want an economy pen for general use, this would be a very good choice.

Hey! For once, this isn’t Deb – she’s mending pens. This is Gordon, her worse half. I want to say something in context about writing with ink.

When I was a tiny nipper, I began my education in a little country school. My first teacher was the delightful Miss McKenzie, who was patient, kind and had years of experience of imparting information to little minds. Unfortunately at the end of my first term she retired and was replaced by Mrs Stewart, who was younger and full of ideas and also a psychopathic sadist. My, did she enjoy applying the ruler to young knuckles!

In any case, the first couple of years’ writing was done with a pencil, and we young sprogs (when we were not howling from the latest beating) looked forward to the day when we, like our seniors, would be allowed to use a pen. That day came at last and dip pens were laid in the groove on our desks and ink (Stephens, I believe, with that strange odour that lives with me to this day) was poured into our inkwells. Wonderful! How I was looking forward to this and to the copperplate I would lay across my white, lined page! Then we were told to begin copying a sentence which teacher had written on the blackboard. I dipped my pen, made my first stroke and disaster! All the ink in my pen landed on the page in a great blot and when I tried again the sharp nib dug into the paper and produced a series of splashes across the paper. I hadn’t even written a single letter yet and the page was ruined! In the sweat of my brow I persevered and managed to scrawl a word or two before I felt the looming presence of Mrs Stewart at my shoulder.

I don’t remember quite what was said but I do remember the tugging of the ear and the ruler on the knuckles. I’m not sure how that was meant to improve your writing, as your hand trembled and your knuckles swelled. And so it went on. I never came to terms with the dip pen and it was only a couple of years later, when we were finally allowed to use fountain pens that I began to appreciate the sweet kiss of nib on paper.

Here’s a 1934 advert. I have, literally, hundreds of these adverts and I should post examples more often. As well as the rather tasty fountain pens, there are examples of the nibs available at the time. Earlier, many more nib types were on offer. If I ever come across that earlier list of nibs in the chaos that I call my archive, which can only happen when I’m looking for something else, I’ll be sure to post it.

As well as the delightful pens and the nibs, take note of the mouthwatering prices. I know that what appear to be trivial prices today were a lot of money back then, but allow me to dream…

Nibs are also referred to as “points”, a term that has virtually vanished from current usage except for a few anachronistic authors who sit down to write wearing tailcoats, high collars and top hats.

Here’s a nice English Waterman 575 Crusader. These pens were brought out in 1948 and they are often described as Taperites, but they aren’t. Those Crusaders with open nibs are technically not Taperites, though there are Crusaders with enclosed nibs that are Taperites. I’m sure this wasn’t done with any intent to confuse. They come in a couple of styles, the most obvious difference being in the section. Later ones have more traditional sections than this pen.

At 13 cm it’s an average size, average weight pen for its time. The aluminium cap is divided into five sections by incised lines, and the sections are gold anodised. The clip is the standard art deco design that Waterman used on its pens at that time. The cap closes against a gold plated clutch ring. The barrel is made from a hard burgundy plastic. The section is black and the pen has a 14 carat gold nib. In all, the design goes together well and the effect is pleasing.

Despite an effort to appear modern, this is an entirely traditional pen, with a normal lever filling system and feed. In use, it’s well-balanced and a very pleasant pen to write with, with some flexibility. Both the anodising and the plating have survived better than most of this manufacturer’s pens of this time.

So that’s the Crusader. I have the impression that it was at the lower end of Waterman’s range at the time, but like the Taperites these pens have survived well and are not uncommon. Their worst fault is a tendency for the clutch to loosen but that can be easily put right.

I’m a restorer and seller, not a collector, so I don’t really get deeply into the arcana of identity and dates of pens. I’m quite happy if I can put a name on it and I can date it within the decade. So I’ll accept what’s written on the side of the pen which is “Swan Safety Pen” which appears to have been an uncommon precursor of the Swan Safety Screw Cap. I would guess that this places it at 1911 or shortly before.

This stubby little pen is 11.1 cm capped but it’s a reasonable length posted, at 14.1 cm. When it came to me it had a non-original plated nib. I replaced that with a rather nice number three Swan nib with a complex breather hole formed a of circle and diamond. It’s a beautiful nib and it has some flexibility. The cap of the pen is inscribed “screw cap tightly” with an arrow pointing in the appropriate direction so you won’t get lost. The black hard rubber is as black as the day it came out of the factory and the machine patterning is sharp enough to cut you.

I’ve seen one or two of these little pens before. They are, in my experience, always in this near-pristine condition. It’s just about the best black hard rubber that I’ve seen. What were they? Probably purse pens, or perhaps they were intended to slip into a waistcoat pocket (that’s a vest, to Left Puddlians). I think it’s an indication of Mabie Todd’s confidence in their screw cap, which they believed would not dump an eyedropper-full of ink into a pocket or handbag.

It’s a gorgeous little pen and moderately rare – this is probably only the third that I’ve handled in the last 10 years.