How to Refill a Pilot Varsity

I am in California right now and I don't have any fountain pens with me because I don't have a very good system down for traveling with my pens. But I miss them and I've been meaning to write this post for a while now. I also need writing practice for an upcoming ACT test. So here we go...

Things you will need:

• An Empty Varsity
• Paper towels (Ink can be messy)
• Pliers (may not be necessary)
• Pipette or eyedropper
• Fountain Pen Ink

The Pilot Varsity is a really nice little pen for the price. They are "disposable", but they can get more use if you know how to refill them. Below is a picture of my two Varsitys, I have one that came filled with purple ink and another that came filled with blue ink. The original ink colour is indicated by the top of the cap. I scraped the grey coating off of the purple one, you can see the difference below. I will be refilling the purple one, so you'll get to see what it looks like inside.

 

Start out by removing the nib/feed from the pen body. You may need to use the pliers if this is the first time you are refilling. Make sure you cover the nib with a paper towel to protect it from the pliers. Then wash the nib/feed. I'm using a cup for the demonstation, but a sink works better, just be careful to not to let anything go down the drain. Seperate the nib from the feed and rinse until water is clear of ink.

 Pictured below is the feed with the nib removed.

 Rinse out the body and the cap. Let them air dry on a paper towel.

The Pilot Varsity has a unique wick feed. The ink is drawn down the wick to the nib, rather than the normal method of the writing paper drawing the ink from the feed.

Because of this feature, you need to make sure you rinse the wick out really well, especially if you want to refill with a lighter coloured ink.

I'm going to refill with Noodler's Dark Matter Ink. I wrote a review of it here.

 Use your pipette or eye dropper to fill up the body of the pen. Don't fill it past the little ridge on the body. As you can see, the ink doesn't fill the entire body, but the ink capacity is quite a bit compared to other pens.

 

Put the nib back on the feed. The Varsity has a medium nib size, but I think it is more broad than other Japanese mediums.

 

 Reassemble the pen. Make sure you get the feed all the way back in or it will leak.

 Let the pen sit upside down for about an hour to let the wick start drawing the ink.

That's it! When you first begin to write with it the ink may appear watery from water in the wick, but it should fix itself.