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Sheaffer
Snorkel Era Nib Codes 1952-1958 by Jim Mamoulides 9/11/03
Making The GradeGrading pen nibs can be a challenge, especially with the tendency for modern nibs to be a shade wider than their vintage counterparts. Most of us who have picked up a modern pen have noticed that they are marked on the nib or section with the grade, and usually in simple letter form, such as F, M, or B, for fine, medium, and broad, respectively. Vintage pens are often not nearly so intuitive in their markings.
When the Sheaffer Snorkel was introduced in 1952, Sheaffer offered the pen with sixteen catalogued point grades and five nib types. To keep things straight, Sheaffer created a code system to visually identify the nib type and grade. These codes will show on the face of open nibs or on the back of Triumph or sheath nibs.
The code will be lightly etched as a two digit "core" code indicating the point grade and the nib style, with a prefix and / or suffix digit added as a modifier. In all cases, the first core digit is a letter code for the grade and the second core digit is a number code indicating the type or style of the nib. The vast majority of nibs will only have two digits. The letter point grade codes (first digit) are as follows:
Sheaffer also made a three tine Music nib, but I haven't seen any examples to determine if they have a letter point grade code or not, and what the code may be. The number style codes (second digit) are as follows:
There are also additional letter codes (prefix or suffix digits to the above two, when used) that indicate either Flexible, Left Oblique, or Right Oblique, as follows:
Given a large number of Snorkels, one may only find a few pens with codes marked on them. There are two reasons for this. First, the code etching is very light and can be easily polished out. Second, Sheaffer stopped marking the nibs sometime in 1958, so those pens would not have coded nibs.
So What Nib Style Goes On Which Pen? Each Snorkel pen model used a specific nib, which in some cases was the principal difference between two models. For example, the Clipper and Sentinel are exactly the same pen, except the Clipper is fitted with a Palladium-silver Triumph nib (number 4) and the Sentinel is fitted with a 14 karat two-toned palladium masked Triumph (number 5). The Saratoga / Admiral and Statesman / Valiant models are distinguished in the same way. Here is how the models break down by style code:
What's The 5 On The Admiral Nib Mean?
Many collectors will look at the above list with a Snorkel Admiral in hand and say, "Great, but what does that 5 in the center of the nib mean?" It's not a mistake. It's a hold-over from an older Sheaffer nib numbering system where 5 indicated a plain 14 karat gold open nib (no palladium mask). Evidently, Sheaffer's nib making machine or nib stamp had the 5 as part of the stamp and it was probably too much trouble to remove it. What About Tip-Dip Pen Codes? Interestingly, the codes also apply to the steel nibbed Tip-Dip Touchdown pens. In all cases on Tip-Dip pens, the second "core" digit will be the number 1, indicating a stainless steel open nib. Tip-Dip pens had a more limited number of point styles, a subset of the sixteen available on the Snorkels and no obliques.
Tip-Dip nibs were initially offered in Extra Fine, Fine, Medium, Broad and Stub in three levels of firmness: firm, semi-flexible, and flexible, as well as Shorthand. This gave a total of sixteen choices, as with the Snorkels. By the 1963 Catalog, the list had grown much shorter and shows only six nibs: Shorthand, Extra Fine, Fine, Medium, Broad and Stub, with no indication of any flexibles, so all were likely firm nibs. The 1953 Sheaffer Catalog lists the following sixteen gold Triumph points. Each is listed below with their corresponding codes from the table above.
Having no marked example of a Flexible Left Oblique Stub, it's a good guess that the coding would be FS5L, but I'll wait until I see one. The same goes for the Broad Stub, which might be a BS5 or an SB5, using "core" codes as a prefix. If there is a medium or fine Stub, though not listed, it would seem logical that it would follow the same pattern. As stated above, since I don't have a marked Music nib, I don't know what, if any code was used.
Clearly, this list is not the complete list of all identified Snorkel nibs. There is also a Right Oblique Stub nib and a Flexible Right Oblique Stub, for example. The list could be eighteen, or more, given some additional possible combinations. Hopefully this has both cleared up and added a dimension of mystery to the code story. At least the code is decipherable! Consider yourself an official Sheaffer Snorkel "code breaker"! So much of the information in this article is from the works of Sam Marshall that I feel it necessary to give him credit for his extensive research. Comments on this article may be sent
to the author, Jim Mamoulides |
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