36 replies to this topic

[Mastersmith043]

I went up pen hunting in Texarkana today with my girlfriend, and we spotted this Jade green Sheaffer Flattop in the first stop of the day.

I don't really know any specifics about these pens, except that they were the first colored plastic pens, the plastic discolors from the sac (which has happened) and that the white dot was a lifetime guarantee. 

I'd really like a bit more info about this pen, I'm planning on selling it eventually, and I like to have specifics.

The pen is just over 4.5 inches long capped. 

I apologize for the terrible pics, but I have nowhere I can take better ones at the moment. 

 

(My girlfriend has really small hands)

 

[rpk1204]

Here are mine per our chat...

 

 

Enjoy!

[Mastersmith043]

Here are mine per our chat...

 

 

Enjoy!

The color on that one is fantastic! Thanks for sharing.

[needfulthings]

Here is the 7-30

Attached Files

•  IMG_4423.jpg   17.62KB   0 downloads
•  IMG_4426.jpg   8.35KB   0 downloads

[david i]

Color is a big deal on these. Yours looks to be the standard-girth short Lifetime.  It really isn't a "Junior" though collectors have had habit to map Parker Duofold jargon onto the poor varmint.

 

Roger no doubt can wax eloquent regarding year-of-issue, catalogue model code and so forth.

These are rock solid pens, often found at low price when color is off (as are most), and very easily restored to make nice users.

 

Note that there can be more than sac contributing to discoloration. Sweat, humidity, sunlight, ink, and so forth...

 

Too there has been debate as to whether there are different shades (originally) of jade. It is possible the claimed early "light" jade in fact started out similar to later "dark" jade, but was subject to intrinsic instability, shifting to lighter color. I have mint pens that are uniformly light, clearly not a sac effect.  I do suspect there were shade variations, but subtle ones. Late flat-tops and late Balances seem to have a hint more blue and hold up better regarding color

 

I have never shot my Jade Sheaffer flat-tops all in a row.   Perhaps it is time.  For the moment though, I guess I can offer an example of good n' bad color

 

Great color. Low set clip indicates a late production piece. Flat-ball on that clip indicates later production still, perhaps late 1934 or later.

 

 

 

 

OK. Here's a challenge. Can you find the jade celluloid Sheaffer with good color?

 

 

 

regards

 

David

[david i]

The hobby generally treats Sheaffer as the first pen maker to use Celluloid.  This appears true among the Big 5.  However, there has been some discussion, mainly on the now defunct Lion & Pen, considering whether the smaller maker Leboeuf was first to that party.

 

regards

 

david

[david i]

OK. I'm off to shoot my Jade flat end Sheaffers.

[rpk1204]

Guessing this is a bit of a trick question?   The obvious answer would be 4th from the left, so I'll go with 2nd from right - it's consistent anyway... lo.

[rpk1204]

Can't wait to see them.... maybe I'll shoot all mine together this weekend and we can have a Sheaffer-fest.... Guessing my collection is much smaller, too! 

 

Randy

[needfulthings]

I think I have four jade Sheaffers, maybe five.  

[david i]

My tray of  Sheaffer flat-end pens in Jade Celluloid.  Finding  green pens is not difficult. Finding them with clean color is a heftier challenge. These fairly well pop.

 

There is a great deal to consider in this tray.

 

  The green pen 4th from left is a very pale green.  The color wholly is even, cap and barrel. The pen is pre New Old STock. No nib, no lever, no signs of use, apparently never made into whole pen, no sac.  Some have claimed this was a different shade from get go. It is quite possible though that some jade pens, maybe early jade pens, had intrinsic instability, blanching from light or spontaneously (no protected areas, even where barrel covered by cap). Pens that went pale also discolored by typical fashion, so barrels can be ambered, etc.

 

There is a cutaway demo in the middle.

 

The OS pens and most  to right of the are late product, 1930's, off catalogue, without lever pins, having later lever ring. Things mix up a bit for the last few items.  note the Quill pen, (black tail)

 

There is a perfect Transitional or Half Balance pen near right, a flat-end Univer that is a rebadged/sub-brand  Sheaffer and a round-ended (but not really streamlined) sub-brand/rebadged Craig (Craig Sheaffer was Walter's son).

 

 

 

 

 

I don't collect flat-end Sheaffers in completist fashion, so I don't buy weak jade for my collection, but when a crisp-color pen turns up, if a duplicate it goes to the website, if not I add it to the collection

 

regards

 

david

[JonSzanto]

That is such a killer photo. Damn.

 

Though I just realized that this may be the closest I have to a "mini": I've got three jade Sheaffer flat-ends. Go me.

[Roger W.]

Late jade tends to be better than early jade.  You might wonder how long it took before jade went bad.  Seeing that jade was first used in late 1924 and the Sheaffer repair manual of 1927 states that after you use their recommended cleaning technique you may find the jade permanently discolored - it happened right away.  Sheaffer was working hard to get jade stable because green wasn't black which was really cool in 1924.

 

Roger W.

 

J5-30s, note the first clip and the first ringtop are early jade and the second is late jade.  A lot has been made of various colors of jade but, as ads are consistent in their depiction of jade there is a reasonable school of thought that all early jade, even aged correctly, faded.  I've seen similar happen to white bakelite desk bases and we know it was white from the catalogs are universally an even tan today.  Was the color always the same over the years it was produced?  I doubt exactly.

 

J7-30s early and late

 

[rpk1204]

Thanks for sharing David, and you answered a question I hadn't asked yet... which was about the Univer.  I picked up a near-perfect Univer pencil this weekend and threw it in my collection because the jade was very nice.  Now I know it's really a Sheaffer.  Much easier to find nice jade pencils than pens if the gold caps aren't beat to crap.   

[snorkelcc]

Agree with Roger, Sheaffer did have several shades of Jades but they just promoted it as Jade in general. Today, these different shades of Jade are normally referred as bright or pale Jade...

 

I have both bright and pale Jade that are mint with stick at the end, which supports Sheaffer at least got 2 shades of Jade pens when they were new !

 

I notice some exceptions, as I remember all the Jade 46 (no matter J46C, J46SR or J46SC) as well as the double band J7-30C I have seen so far are all in pale Jade ! May be this is only because of my small sampling mistake, any idea on bright jade 46 or dual band J7-30C ?

 

CC

 

[Procyon]

One of my favorite pens to carry and use on a daily basis is a Jade Sheaffer Flat Top.  It is discolored in an interesting way.  Here is a picture comparing it to two others with more original color. 

 

 

 

It is the pen on the right.  Instead of fading to an olive brown color overall, in this pen certain parts of the plastic seem to have turned black, leaving the green as original.  It is pretty much uniform over both the cap and barrel.   I actually like the look of this, but have always wondered what could have caused it.  I have a bunch more that are discolored in the usual way, but this one is unique.  Curious if anyone else has seen this?

Edited by Procyon, 03 January 2014 - 06:36 PM.

[Roger W.]

I see a lot of late jade get that black discolor that is not all that unattractive - I would agree.

 

Roger W.

[david i]

Hi Snorkel and Procyn.

 

While Jade Celluloid perhaps is the most prevalent color besides  perhaps black  used in pendom  during the mid 1920's-early 1930's, this common color offers uncommon collecting challenges, even besides the task of finding uncommon examples of this common color still with  good color. Whew...

 

Sheaffer collecting also offers nuances and challenges, ones that require a fair bit of effort and/or experience about which to even be aware.  Geez, I hope that doesn't sound condescending. I don't mean it to be.

 

So, to touch on a couple points you brought up.

 

SnorkelCC, yeah during the course of ten+ years of usage, there might be some native variations in hue/pattern to Jade (generally a green marbled with some white or with different green) Celluloid.  Roger touched on this.   But, a key point is that it is likely the dramatic difference between what some early Sheaffers have, with that milky/pale/yellow-green Jade,  from the more commonly seen darker/richer green found on pens that still date to 1920's , perhaps/probably  does  not represent original differences. There is reason to suspect that early plastic had a wholesale instability that let it shift to the ore pale yellow-ish green  hue, independent of use and abuse, that it started out looking like the darker green.

 

Consider the following picture. There is good chance the top two pens (let's ignore the Balance, itself a bit late issue for jade Balance)  started out the same color.  Or close to it.  Really. We suspect sheaffer did not offer  the pale middle color as that pale color at time of issue, that the pen faded. This example is a mint pre-NOS pen that never was completed. No lever. No nib. No use.

 

 

 

This does not exclude subtle batch variation and evolutionary variation in the jade color. But, it embraces the point that what we today call color variation might not have been there originally.  This of course is independent of obvious ambering/browning of pens due to use, sac exposure etc.

 

 

 

Procyon, I wil address your photo next post.

 

 

 

regards

 

david

[Mike Hosea]

That is such a killer photo. Damn.

 

Though I just realized that this may be the closest I have to a "mini": I've got three jade Sheaffer flat-ends. Go me.

 

I'm suspecting that this site isn't really good for me.  I've always called myself a user, not a collector, but when I take a look through my pen cases (!) the story is starting wearing thin.  I mean, today I received this

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=370975059669

 

jade green standard, non-lifetime, early Balance that I bought with no intention of using it.  I knew the threads would have a problem, and I saw the brassing, but the nib, the color, and the price were good, and I had no jade Sheaffers.  This is a bad sign.  The next thing you know I'll be trolling antique stores, attending pen shows, buying free-standing pen chests.

[philm]

This is a very interesting discourse on Sheaffer plastics, I must admit.  As an interesting, and non-educating, aside - let us not forget the Sheaffer Jade wannabees -

 

In this instance - a very nice Blue Ribbon (NPP), below a Frankensheaffer:

 

 

Phil

Edited by philm, 03 January 2014 - 06:55 PM.