Fountain Pens

I am currently in the process of learning to love my FPR Himalaya V2. I was disappointed in it when I first got it, but I recently pulled it back out, and it is winning me over slowly but surely. I have been researching a bit about ebonite and how it is made, and it has given me a new appreciation for this pen. It is completely unique, and I absolutely love that. I have always preferred loving craftsmanship over clever engineering, so a pen like this would make sense for me. What do you guys think?

So I just got this new pen today. The ordering and shipping process was highly unpleasant, but the product itself is pretty damn good. If you can't tell, this pen is made of denim, which I think is pretty cool. It writes smoothly, and it's big and hefty. If you can get one from a reseller, rather than the official website, I can recommend it.

Nib: Extra fine tip Ink: take-sumi iroshizuku

I used to dream of owning a LAMY 2000 back in college, only recently got to the place in life where a pen of that caliber is within the (kinda) budget. Looked into more of the lineup and opted for the Dialog 3 in the end after nerding over the capless design.

I never would have thought I'd have a shot for something like this, so excited to put miles on it, going to be writing a good bulk of my notes for tabletop Cyberpunk with it!

Got a new ink from my son for my birthday.

I’ve been having trouble keeping this instance up - right now, it’s a problem with proxy errors between the docker containers as well as with the Ansible scripts. It’s taking too much time to maintain. I'll be shutting down wayfarershaven.eu per 31 October 2023.

That means that the fountainpens community here will also disappear. Anyone who would like to restart this on another instance is more than welcome to do so.

Hey all! My apologies for the fact that the instance has been down. For those who are curious, it turns out that the Lemmy volumes had ballooned and taken up all the space on the server. I've reclaimed the space and set a recurring task to make sure that it automatically gets cleaned up going forward.

This shows the vulnerability of small instances run by a single admin - I wasn't able to sit down and troubleshoot the issue. I don't have a good solution for you beyond recognizing that sometimes things willl take time when there isn't a team or paid business with SLAs. If you have things you'd like to see change, I'm happy to discuss.

Notebook is a Maruman Mnemosyne A5. These items were purchased at a shop in St. Louis, Missouri.

Are there any inks that wash out of clothing very quickly and easily? I'm especially interested in inks that wash out cleanly without stain treatment.

Edit: Washing quickly and easily off the toddler is a bonus.

This article over on Hack-A-Day seemed like it would appeal here. It discusses how the physical aspects of a cheap ballpoint pen are just less well suited to cursive writing as compared to a fountain pen. Enjoy!

Pilot Metropolitan Calligraphy Nib - Herbin Rouge Grenat

As we round the corner into autumn in the northern hemisphere, the air is a little crisper, the days are shorter, and the leaves are changing... and looking for some new inks to try out. Do you have favorite inks for the season?

Got a fair price on ebay on a couple of Sailor 21s. Love them, but modern converters seem to fit only in theory.

Cutting them down works, but also makes it nearly impossible to advance or retract, because there's no leverage on the screw that moves the plunger.

Am I missing an obvious source here?

Edit: They can be made to unscrew if a syringe is used to push the plunger up consistently, there's just enough to grab onto. Still not ideal, but...

I know the A-series is more common, but I sometimes prefer the B-series. It's nice if, for example, you're looking for something between A4 and A5 (i.e. B5).

Individual images made by Wikipedia user Bromskloss (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Hello, all! I've only recently jumped from dip pen calligraphy to the wonderful world of fountain pens, so I naturally found myself drawn to the Noodler's flex nibs. I've been using my Creaper for months now and figured I'd finally earned myself the next big sexy- the Triple Tail. It arrived yesterday, and it writes like a dream... mostly. I was dealing with some railroading issues, but I figured I just hadn't filled it quite right since I was filling from a sample vial.

Because it was a shimmering ink (Diamine Stargazer, if anyone's curious), I did a preliminary rinse in water before disassembling the pen for a proper clean. Once I got the nib and feed out, I noticed there was this rather large hole in my feed (see top two images)! My initial assumption was that it was defective, given that I'd already noticed the front underside had some mild imperfections (see bottom two images), but I noticed while I was washing it that the breather tube flows out of / through the hole. I've searched everything I know to search, and I cannot find a picture or even a video showing the top side of the disassembled feed in clear detail. So, owners of Triple Tails, please tell me: is this normal?

I currently have a Life writing pad for letter writing. I like it, but I would like to try some other loose leaf paper. Does anyone have recommendations? I would prefer lined, but unlined is ok if the paper is thin enough to use a guide sheet underneath.

Currently, I use the old Tomoe, but someday that will run out, and it's hard to know what shows off ink the best.

Platinum 3776 and my cat Una.

Sharing because I can see this community having thoughts to share. :)

cross-posted from: https://wayfarershaven.eu/post/182136

> With so much note taking apps nowadays, I can't understand why does anyone still write notes with pen and paper. You need to bring the notepad, book or that paper to retrieve that information, and most of the time you don't have it in hand. While my phone almost always reachable and you carry when you go out. For those still like to do handwriting, there's many app does that and they can even convert it to text notes. > > So, if you still write notes with pen and paper, why?

Currently inked list just keeps getting longer...

Context: I take a ton of notes in meetings, journal, and make lists - for now, I have them all lined up on my left. I take one from the right, use it, and when I put it down it goes on the left.

Next time I need a pen, I grab the next one, and so on. Makes it much easier to discern where things start and end.

Alt text for image: Currently Inked:

• Perkeo / Pumpkin
• Plasir / Golden Ivy
• Metropolitan / Peridot
• Safari / Midway the Magnificent
• Sport / Comet SL9
• Kakuno / Earl Grey
• Safari / Pink Sugar Beach
• Safari / Julia
• Preppy / Quinuai
• Perkeo / Hana Ikada
• Prefounte / Apple Glory
• Preppy / Topical Glow
• Perkeo / Song Southern Country -Perkeo / Hotaru Bi
• Sailor / Peach Haze
• Perkeo / Sodalite
• Sport / O.F. Schwartz
• Safari / Tsutsuji.

Each written with the pen and ink combo in question.

Oh boy, where do I even start. Some time ago I decided to buy a second pen. I wanted something cheap to use with a document ink. Because my choises of ink were quite limited (and still are), I decided to pick Koh-I-Noor Document Blue as

• relatively cheap ink,
• relatively well-behaved ink (allegedly),
• bottle says it's blue.

As for the pen, I decided to buy Kaweco Perkeo with M nib size for no particular reason, besides nice nib quality (allegedly), and it being basically overgrown Kaweco Sport, which people say is a good pen.

And well, I kinda hate and love this duo at the same time.

First of all - colour. It's nice shade of blue, if you filling your converter as intende. Which means inserting it inside the pen and then dipping the nib in ink.

Otherwise the colour of ink will be a bit different. You can say it's blue, but not quite. It's too soft and pastel for it's own good. Especially when you consider that officials don't like different colours when you're signing documents.

To be fair it's indeed a document ink. It's fairly water-resistant. In my tests water didn't blur the ink very much, and in the rubbing test Koh-I-Noor surrendered, when the paper started to wear out, so in that regard the ink is adequate.

And speaking of it's water-resistance, as any other document ink, Koh-I-Noor Document Blue will clog your pen when you don't write with it frequently enough. Well, at least write once a week with it, or your pen will start skipping.

Speaking of the pen, you definitely need to wash it before use, or it will burp ink when converter is half-full. When I didn't wash the nib and feed properly, I was experiencing skipping, and colour was a bit dull.

Nib is good. Lines are thinner than Lamy Safari M nib, and it writes smooth.

So in conclusion, maybe I just need to use another ink in my Perkeo. But for now it works.

I occasionally have to read & critique manuscripts for work and I find it much easier to do with a printed page. But the computer paper that we have in the office is not ideal for fountain pens - tons of bleeding and feathering.

Does anybody have experience with computer printer paper that is relatively FP friendly?

I thought I might keep a ream or two at my desk and swap out some sheets when I'm about to print something that I'll be writing on. (Something relatively budget friendly would be great too... Not planning on putting Tomoe River through the office printer!)

Today is Montblanc Heritage 1912 \<B CI\> with Aurora Black, taking notes at work. What about you?

Do we have a wiki? Didn't see one, in the sidebar. Would be willing to host and port content from r/fp. There was some very useful data/collected wisdom there.

Edit 23-08-10: It's live, and there's even some content there. Descend freely upon it, y'all know what to do. :) Working on rules, wiki, and the trappings of communities that aren't yet baked into the codebase.

https://wayfarershaven.eu/post/154395

https://wayfarershaven.eu/c/pen_swap

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Nice to meet you all, I used to be active over on the other place...

One of the resources I liked having was Pen_Swap - is there any interest here in something like that?

Thank you to @[email protected] for submitting the suggestions for a banner and to everyone who voted! The photo of the Nakaya Decapod (#3) won by a 60% landslide.

This interesting pen was released by Nahvalur at the 2023 DC Pen Show. They had an announcement event that featured the CEO of Nahvalur and Ralph Reyes, the nibmeister behind Regalia Writing Labs. The speakers' passion for writing instruments was clear through the presentation, and the collaboration has borne delicious fruit. As each nib is hand-tuned by Ralph, it is a limited run of 50 pens. I think selling a steel-nib pen at this price point is an unconventional choice, but the nib is good enough to make this cost reasonable.

And what a nib it is! Early days, but it is certainly fun to play with. Very expressive for everyday writing, but not so soft that it would be a problem for anyone with a light hand. Smooth and pleasant on the page, a bit of feedback that aids precision but nothing draggy or toothy. Very, very wet, and the flow keeps up with the flex nicely.

I also really like the Atlantic Blue ink from Nahvalur. It shades beautifully, flows well, mildly lubricated; the tint is suitable for business, but interesting all the same.

The pen rest is from Toyooka Craft in their new blue stain. Photographs don't do this stain justice, it has a subtle change in shading at the edges that's kind of reminiscent of a tamenuri urushi finish. The journal the pen is resting on in the last picture is from Garny Leather; they have a textured leather that's nicer than any other journal cover I've held.

Writing samples, additional image: https://imgur.com/a/8ZvVXfN

Text in the long writing sample is from Journey to the West, Anthony C Yu, trans. on Clairefontaine Séyès-ruled A5+ ring-bound. The paper in the short sample is Nebula Casual Note.

ps. There were other pens introduced at the event; two new Original Plus colors; two new Nautilus colorways; and a pretty Year of the Rabbit IKKAKU pen named after Chang'e's jade rabbit, Yu-Tu. I was tempted by the Yu-Tu, as the rabbit theme is adorable, but Ralph's nib made the decision easy.

I bought a Wingsung 699 recently from AliExpress because I wanted to try out a vacuum filler. Ink leaks from around the nib whenever I cap it, leading to ink getting on the grip. When I write, blobs of ink sometimes burp out onto the page. Is this typical for this brand? I have another no name Wingsung (I think it's actually a knockoff of the Hongdian dark forest) that has no issues.

@fountainpens We need special Diamine inks.

We have four possibilities for a new community banner image thanks to @[email protected]. Please vote by commenting on which image you would prefer. One comment will be one vote. Voting closes on Friday 4 August.

#1 - may need some cropping to find the right aspect ratio: !Image #1

#2 - Montblanc Heritage 1912 !Image #2

#3 - Nakaya Decapod !Image #2

#4 - Waterman, TWSBI, Nakaya, Pelikan, Lamy, Parker, Montblanc, Pelikan, Montblanc !Image #2

These are photos from when I first took delivery of my Nakaya, an aka tamenuri (red urushi lacquer) Neo-Standard, from back in 2016. The nib was an SF with added flex cuts, and though it ran dry fairly quick, when it was primed it wrote in an almost brush-like manner. It was very unique, but difficult to use every day, which is part of why I got rid of it.

The big, beautiful nib of the Montblanc 149 is what first captured my interest in fountain pens. Many years later, and many pens tried, I have a handful I really just love writing with and I still think the nib designs are some of the most beautiful.

1950s Montblanc Slimline, XXF Modern Montblanc 146, BB CI 1960s Montblanc 149, EF Montblanc Heritage 1912, B CI

I was riding with a Wing Sung 3009 today (a pretty nice, super cheap piston filler BTW) when I noticed this gunk on the inside of the cap. I'm pretty sure that I filled the pen up with Noodler's Air Corps Blue/Black a few months ago and then let the pen sit. It wrote pretty much right away.

But I noticed this brownish / tan / black residue on the inside of a cap, at the very bottom. I'm not sure if it was there before and I just didn't notice, or if it is new. It almost looks like burned plastic? Or maybe it's mold? But it seems like a weird place for mold to develop since there's no ink there. Has anybody seen anything like this before? I'm probably going to throw the pen away anyway (it's about $3.50) but was curious 🧐.

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I've tried lots of pens over the years. The ones I can remember:

• Conid Bulkfiller Regular
• Cross Aventura
• Jinhao 159, X450, (also whatever the Safari clone is, 777 I think?)
• Lamy 2000, 2000 Amber, Safari
• Montblanc 145, 146, 149, 320, 1912, Slimline
• Nakaya Decapod, Neo-Standard
• Parker IM
• Pelikan M200, M600, M800
• Platinum 3776, Preppy
• TWSBI 580, Eco, Vac 700
• Visconti Homo Sapiens Bronze Age, Dark Age
• Waterman Phileas Blue

I'm not much of a collector, so I have cycled through and gotten rid of almost all of these. I only have around \~10 now, just the ones that I really like, or are sentimental, or are just super unique. One brand that's escaped me is Sailor. I've read about the 21K nibs and how people fawn over them. I know there are die-hard Sailor supporters and it seems to mostly revolve around this nib. But, $300+ for a proprietary cartridge/converter that isn't made from unique materials seems like a lot.

So, if I was going to "try" Sailor, as a manufacturer, where does it make sense to start to see if I get it or not? Do people prefer the Realo (piston filled) variants? From what I can tell here and on /r/fountainpens people are mostly content with the C/C versions. So is it just the unique colors? Or is it just the 21K nib and nothing else matters?

New pen came today: a Jinhao 82. This is Jinhao's "homage" to the Sailor Pro Gear Slim, released late 2022 I think. I got a medium nib, transparent blue body. Takes a #5 nib, available in EF, F, and M.

Overall the pen seems great. Inked it up with Waterman Mysterious Blue and it writes like a treat. Very smooth nib (I don't have a PGS but they have a reputation for having a good amount of feedback; there is none of that with this nib).

The slight translucency and rich dark blue body combine nicely with the gold trim to make this a really attractive pen. I like slightly smaller pens, and got this one to see if I might like the size of a PGS at some point - this is a great fit for me.

Converter included. There's also an O ring - wondering if this might be amenable to eyedroppering?

For $9 this pen is a terrific deal, and it comes in a ton of different color options. This is definitely going to be in my heavy rotation!

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It'd been a minute since I bought a new pen, and I've always wanted to try a vacuum fill pen so I finally pulled the trigger. The pen writes so well straight out of the box but that's always been my experience with TWSBI pens. The kon-peki ink is a nice beautiful blue that also seems to dry fairly quickly which is nice because I'm a lefty and it's impossible for me to write without making a mess lol.

Left hand Lamy Safari Vista alongside a travelers company notebook in basic brown leather.

I was really excited to sneak away for an hour and pick this up on a recent work trip.

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A high school graduation gift from my step grandmother back in the day

Now to figure out how to work it LMAO