Eyedropper conversion Preppy fountain pen

In all the excitement of inktober, I was carrying art materials around with me, and I mislaid my Lamy Safari pen. I have faith that it’s somewhere in the house and I’ve put it somewhere silly, that was perfectly logical at the time. Or it’s right in front of me. So when buying a present for a friend, to make up the free postage I added a new fountain pen with an extra fine nib.

I chose the Platinum Preppy EF which is a 0.2 nib. I really wanted a pilot penmanship because I’ve been watching Weronoyumes’ channel, but they seem to only be available in the UK on amazon at vast expense – considering they’re supposed to be a cheap fountain pen. So I checked that an eyedropper conversion can be done with a preppy, and ordered the rest of the things I would need: pure silicone grease, syringe with blunt needle and o rings in size 5.

I used coloured ink, Diamines deep magenta, woodland green and eau de nil to fill the pen with, greased up the threads between the barrel and the section with the silicone grease, then with great difficulty managed to get the o ring over. It was all very greasy. I did find that when I screwed the pen up the o-ring popped out, but the pen didn’t leak. I don’t know if that’s beginners luck, don’t need one or wrong size o-ring. All was well until the temperature dropped.

That’s how to make an eyedropper conversion leak, if its been stored in a cold place, the air inside the barrel has no insulation against the heat of your hand and it leaks in massive, fast crocodile tears. Only the blue one has leaked, it can be seen in the photo above, the feed is flooded with ink. Since each pen cost less than a converter, and I’d already gotten the extras, I applied more silicone grease to stop the leak, and keep them all topped up with ink, placing the pens down instead of warming them in my hands when I’m not actively drawing. The YouTube video below is where I got all my information.

I possibly got to carried away with taking photos of ink. And been watching to many YouTube photographers shoot in the style of Brandon Woelfel.

The bottom line is I really enjoy using the preppy fountain pen, the lines it’s produces are nice and controllable as it has a very firm nib and I’m not worried about losing it. On water colour paper the ink bleeds out into a slightly thicker line when the nib is allowed to linger on the paper, allowing line variety, and reversing the pen hold so the nib is upside down does allow for a finer line, if scratchy. The pen is nice to hold in the hand, if slightly greasy due to the eyedropper conversion.

The eyedropper conversion is fun and messy, but if you live in a colder climate (the UK, even in the north of England doesn’t get that cold), or store your pens in a cold place, or even just want to take them in and out doors, a process that might make the pen start to leak on its own, having to keep the pen constantly topped up means its not that much more convenient than a converter, although with the preppy the converter is twice the price of the pen, and you have to buy an extra part to make the platinum converter fit the preppy pen.

If you have a cheap fountain pen and want to eyedropper convert it, from my week long research on the topic, I suggest checking your pen barrel does’t have decorative/designed in holes, which I think even silicone grease would be unable to handle.