5 replies to this topic

[penmanila]

i just picked up two very pretty and rather unusual bexleys off ebay--one in red marble with a gold band, and another sheathed in titanium (at least that's what the seller says). the seller you'll know him by the backdrop he employs) also says that the sections come from parker duofold pens (making this a franken-bexley of sorts), although as far as i can tell, being a duofold fan as well, they're nothing like the modern duofold sections i have (which have one or two bands at the collar near the nib). it would be neat if they were indeed threaded for duofold feeds and nibs, so i can optionally replace the bexley nib with 18K duofold units. at any rate, they were very reasonably priced for big bexleys, or shall we say pens with bexley nibs or parts.

has anyone seen these models before or know anything about them? might they have been one-offs created off a hobbyist's lathe (wouldn't mind if they were)?

[penmanila]

this got no response when i posted it just before christmas, but this time i hope our bexley experts can chime in to help me figure out this happy discovery.

the bexleys arrived today (here in the philippines)--happy new year!

they were even more wonderful than i imagined they would be, and i'll show why, but first, a pic of the two pens:





you'll see that one is bigger than the other (something i didn't expect--they were sold separately, so i never saw them side-by-side before this). i'd soon see the sense of the difference in size.

i can now see why the seller thought that they were a mix of bexley and parker parts--they're actually all bexley, no parker at all in them, but just as i suspected, they're the size of the parker duofold centennial (the red one) and international (the titanium), respectively--and more than size, they're threaded to receive and to use the sections and nibs of the duofolds!

here's the red bexley as is:



and here it is, with a section and nib from my greenwich centennial:



here's the bexley and the centennial side by side (i didn't take a pic, but the same holds for the titanium bexley and the international--same size, same swap):



and as a final, fun touch, i decided to replace the generic steel schmidt nib (it didn't even have the bexley name on it) on the titanium pen with what i think should be the perfect replacement--a stipula titanium 1.1 nib, which i just happened to have lying around. so now it's truly a titanium pen with a nib just also happens to flex beautifully:



nice, too, that the pens were priced very reasonably (i wondered why no one else picked them up, as they had been on buy-it-now for quite a while). now i really want to know from the bexley experts here if they'd encountered these models before, or if they might be prototypes, and also if other bexleys have this same amazing swappability with parker duofolds (which i also collect, so i guess i'm in luck parts-wise).

thanks for looking!

[penmanila]

mystery solved (not here, but on FPN)--ron zorn identified these as pens that were done by bexley for mike clifton (i'm sorry but i don't know him--is he a pen dealer or collector? i suppose my implicit question is, can individuals approach bexley and commission special pens? in any event, thanks to mike for having these lovely pens made!) and that these were sold at the ohio pen show last november. many thanks for the information, ron.

Edited by penmanila, 09 January 2013 - 10:51 AM.

[david i]

mystery solved (not here, but on FPN)--ron zorn identified these as pens that were done by bexley for mike clifton (i'm sorry but i don't know him--is he a pen dealer or collector? i suppose my implicit question is, can individuals approach bexley and commission special pens? in any event, thanks to mike for having these lovely pens made!) and that these were sold at the ohio pen show last november. many thanks for the information, ron.

Long time collector based in Fairport, NY

Used to (might still) do fair bit with ebay. We were nearly neighbors during my Rochester days.

regards

david

[penmanila]

thanks for the info, david!

[Tutelman]

I guess this falls into the better late than never category but, some time ago, I acquired one of the titanium-sheathed pens pictured above (although mine has coral colored plastic). I knew it was made by Bexley, but there was some confusion as to whether these pens were commissioned by Mike Clifton (as noted above) or by Mike Conway.

Deciding to put the issue to rest, I emailed Howard Levy at Bexley. He let me know they were commissioned by Mike Conway.

And, if you make it to the Ohio Pen Show at the beginning of November, not only can you see the magnificent pens made by Bexley (a sponsor of the event), but also meet exhibitors Mike Conway and Mike Clifton.