Swan Restoration

We received this rather sad looking Swan in a batch of vintage pens recently bought. We've much admired the model for many years as in its original state, the Swan 140/52 was an attractive and functional pen. Its sad tale of woe on receipt included multiple ink stains, stained barrel and cap, twisted nib, broken feed, heavily brassed clip and lever and cap rings which were perishing with oxidisation and badly twisted, not to mention an ink sac which had hardened like rock in the barrel. But, as we had a special fascination for this model Swan, it was worth a little "special attention".

We received this rather sad looking Swan in a batch of vintage pens recently bought. We've much admired the model for many years as in its original state, the Swan 140/52 was an attractive and functional pen. Its sad tale of woe on receipt included multiple ink stains, stained barrel and cap, twisted nib, broken feed, heavily brassed clip and lever and cap rings which were perishing with oxidisation and badly twisted, not to mention an ink sac which had hardened like rock in the barrel. But, as we had a special fascination for this model Swan, it was worth a little "special attention".
The condition and plating of the cap clip and rings almost of themselves, rendered the pen as "junk" status.	The nib and feed had seen much better days.	The cap was badly ink stained and carried heavy celluloid staining, something that cannot be removed.
The cap clip required careful removal in order to straighten and re-plate it. It was also necessary to remove, clean and re-plate the rather tired lever which had rusted to its celluloid insert slot.	And then ....	Much of the cap staining was removed and after a straighten and re-plate, the clip adopted acceptable and recognisable form. The original rings, although badly perished and twisted, were removed from the cap and were built up with metal and re-plated.
A new feed was fabricated and the nib straightened to new condition.	Ink staining and a light level of celluloid staining was removed from the cap.	The original rings and clip complement the somewhat cleaner cap.
It is now in acceptable (but not perfect) condition for a vintage pen. It was impossible to remove the staining to the celluloid of the barrel which was caused by a combination of rusting lever bar and lever mechanism and traditional ink spoilage due to an ink sac which failed decades ago. And, it writes very well!