The original Conway Stewart Pen Company (CS) was located in England and in operation for over 100 years. But, sadly, they had to close their business in October 2014. If you’re not familiar with the company and their pens, they were a British company that had been in operation since the very early 1900’s, with more than two dozen different pen styles to their credit over their many years in business. Their most famous tagline was “they made the pens for the Queen”.

A little trivia: Contrary to what many may believe, the name “Conway Stewart” did not come from the name of the founder of the company, but rather it was believed to have been derived from a popular vaudeville act of the day. If you would like to read more into the history of The Conway Stewart Pen Company, you can find additional information at wikipedia.org/Conway-Stewart.

CS material: Eventually, the original materials and parts were sold off and made available on the open market. Some original material is still available today, coming out of the original manufacturing plant in the UK. If you have an interest in having a replica of a CS pen made, please send me an email.

There were several issues I needed to confront in order to make the JEBs 58:

#1. The Nib: Although you can order the JEBs 58 with the smaller #5 nib, I also wanted to offer it with a larger #6 nib, just as I have with the small Dandy. And so being able to offer the larger nib may present a challenge with the short length. Another challenge was the raised-band feature. These present challenges because, as is always the case when making a new pen style, I’m limited to currently available hardware and machining techniques, so sometimes I have to make compromises. Luckily, though, I was able to stay fairly close to the original 58 specs with just two minor compromises:

#2. The short length: As I mentioned previously, the CS 58 was a small pen with a capped length of 13 cm, which is about 5 1/8″. The short length was achieved using an externally mounted clip and a short barrel. The externally mounted clip allowed nearly the entire length of the cap to be used for recessing the nib and section, instead of the need for a separate threaded finial taking up inside space. Only 1/4″ at the top was used to recess the insert for the clip screw. CS used this top-mounted clip on many of their pens, allowing them to have a shorter overall footprint.

As it was with the JEB’s Dandy, the method I must use to mount the cap bands prohibits recessing the barrel past the threads when capping the pen. So to have the same capped length as the original 58, I used a slightly shorter barrel. But even though the barrel is shorter, I was able to get one of the shorter full-size converters to fit (see below). If you want to use a Schmidt-brand converter, you can order the pen with a longer 3″ barrel. Another option is to choose the new lever-filler upgrade.

#3. The cap diameter: The cap diameter is based on the diameter of the accent bands that were available. The original 58 cap was about .53″ (13.45mm) at the base, with bands of about .545″ (13.85mm). The closest diameter bands I had available that came close to that size were 15mm (outside diameter). But because the bands were slightly raised, I had to consider more than just the diameter. They also had to be thick enough to sit proud once installed, so they had to have a thicker wall with a smaller INSIDE DIAMETER in order to have enough thickness to have them sit proud of the cap. So the 15mm bands were the closest size I could find that would fit the parameters, so I paired them with a 9/16″ (.563″ or 14.3mm) material diameter.

I was concerned that because I had to make the cap diameter a little larger at the base, it would mess up the nice sweeping taper as the cap reduces in diameter as it goes up to meet the clip ring, causing the cap to look more bulky than the original. But once it was completed and I compared it with the original cap (as in the photo above), the taper didn’t appear to be affected. The taper itself kind of takes some getting used to, in my opinion, but it kind of grows on you after a while.

#4. The clip: The 58 has a uniquely styled clip featuring an integrated external clip ring that’s secured to the top of the cap. The larger CS 100 uses a similar clip. And I was very lucky to find a supply of those original clips to use with my version. And as with my Churchill/Duro clips, I had to have them re-plated.

So then my last concern was coming up with a secure method of mounting the clip so it would hold up to the rigors of a pen clip that would be used as it was intended. Clips that are used as intended (routinely clipped to a pocket) are under a lot of stress at the ring. And a clip with an externally mounted ring has all that stress on the outside instead of the inside (under the finial), so it requires a very strong connection.

On my first mock-up, I made an acrylic finial that would have to be glued in place. But I don’t like to attach parts with glue. I like to be able to disassemble all the parts in case something has to be replaced. So I had to come up with a method of securing the clip. My ultimate solution was to use a small brass dome-shaped hex-head screw along with a threaded push-in insert. The combination makes a very secure connection for the clip. And the screw allows the clip to be removed if necessary.

Because of the very short barrel, I thought I would have to limit the standard inking system to a cartridge only. But I found that I could trim about 1/8″ off the top of one of the generic converters, so it was short enough to easily fit inside the barrel depth. So the standard inking system is C/C (cartridge/converter), or you can upgrade it to a lever-filler.