Ballpoint pen is a pen that used nowadays, using a smooth rolling point of the tip in the pen. Unlike fountain pen, you don’t need to fill in ink for writing. The first patent on a ballpoint pen was issued on 30 October 1888, to John Loud, a leather tanner, who was attempting to make a writing instrument that would be able to write on his leather products, which then-common fountain pens could not do. In the period between 1904 and 1946, particularly alternatives or improvements to the fountain pen were invented.
Slavoljub Eduard Penkala invented a solid-ink fountain pen in 1907, a German inventor named Baum took out a ballpoint patent in 1910, and yet another ballpoint pen device was patented by Van Vechten Riesburg in 1916. In these inventions, the ink was placed in a thin tube whose end was blocked by a tiny ball, held so that it could not slip into the tube or fall out of the pen. The ink clung to the ball, which spun as the pen was drawn across the paper. These proto-ballpoints did not deliver the ink evenly. If the ball socket were too tight, the ink did not reach the paper.
If it were too loose, ink flowed past the tip, leaking or making smears. Many inventors tried to fix these problems, but without commercial success. The principle of ballpoint pen is under the dual role of atmospheric pressure and ink gravity, the ink goes through the pipeline to seat beads, it would adhesion on the ball. When you write on paper, the ink would appear from the ball which is rolling. The ink by the downward force of gravity, and friction on the paper by rolling ball, the pressure of the pen using the ink tube of the air out, you can resume writing function.
You can see the tip has a diameter of about 0. 1cm of the “small ball”, which is made by an alloy of chrome and steel. Also, a pen has the air inside that will cause the ink inside the pressure bar. Oil-based ballpoint pen – the ink viscosity is high, strong water-resistant, but it has more splotch. Neutral pen – the ink viscosity is moderate, less greasy, oily water and light resistance than oil-based ballpoint pen. Water-based ballpoint pen – dilute ink and touch the water will be smudged. Ballpoint pen rolling over a paper surface, leaving behind a trail of ink.
There are two basic types of ball point pens: disposable and refillable. Disposable pens are chiefly made of plastic throughout and discarded when the ink is consumed; refillable pens are metal and some plastic and tend to be much higher in price. The refill replaces the entire internal ink reservoir and ball point unit rather than actually refilling it with ink, as it takes special high-speed centrifugation to properly fill a ball point reservoir with the viscous ink. The simplest types of ball point pens have a cap to cover the tip when the pen is not in use, while others have a mechanism for retracting the tip.
This mechanism is usually controlled by a button at the top and powered by a spring within the pen body, but other possibilities include a pair of buttons, a screw, or a slide. Tip of a ballpoint pen highly magnified Roller ball pens combine the ballpoint design with the use of liquid ink and flow systems from fountain pens; Space Pens, developed by Fisher in the United States, combine a more than normally viscous ballpoint pen ink with a gas-pressured piston which forces the ink toward the point.
This design allows the pen to write even upside down or in zero gravity environments. [8] A graphite pencil can also be used in this way but produces graphite dust, requires sharpening, and is erasable, making it undesirable or unsuitable for use in some situations. A ball point pen, which is a pen that works by a little tiny ball rolls on the bottom of ink pen, is a writing tools used nowadays. Unlike fountain pen from the old days that you have to refill the ink tube to write.
Ballpoint is invented by a man called Laszlo Biro, a Hungarian newspaper editor, who found that its too annoying to fill up inks every time when he writes; therefore, he decided to create a pen that would make him easier. So, he tried to fit in a ball into the tip of the pen; as the pen moved along the paper, the ball will rotated and the ball will pick up inks from the ink tube and create strips to ink marks from the pen. The principle of ballpoint pen is under the dual role of atmospheric pressure and ink gravity, the ink goes through the pipeline to seat beads, it would adhesion on the ball.
When you write on paper, the ink would appear from the ball which is rolling. The ink by the downward force of gravity, and friction on the paper by rolling ball, the pressure of the pen using the ink tube of the air out, you can resume writing function. However, this only works in the earth because when the pen travels out of the earth, gravity of the ink tube will be gone ;therefore the ink will not flow downward and ink will not be coming out and create pen marks.
For this purpose, Fisher in the United States developed a way to solve this problem. They put more ink into the ink tube with gravity pressure in it and make it allows to write in the space or even upside down. Besides, the different types of ink also make difference. For example, the difference between two most common used ink: oil based and water based ink. The oil-based ink has more viscous force than the water-based ink because of its density.
In conclusion, ball point pen is a great invention that make people nowadays life easier; however, this invention isn’t prefect yet. Because sometimes when you haven’t use a pen for a long time, the ink will eventually flow backwards and makes it unable to write or sometimes you dropped the pen. Somehow the latter can not the held and you have to throw the pen away but the former part you can actually put a pen into some warm water and flow the ink back. Furthermore, you shouldn’t press the pen onto the paper for too long time because many ink will flow out.
