[Tangster]

Ehh, one Safari is enough for me. I'm not really going to collect safari's for the sake of it.

 

[TwinQY]

It would be nice if Lamy would do colours for the 2000. And none of this "Black Amber" stuff. I know they did it with Ives and his RED edition. But maybe that wasn't Makralon. There's probably still a way to colour fibreglass though. Probably not cost-effective for them to do it though. And they probably don't want to, when painting Safaris year after year seems to be working well for them. I heard Dark Lilac sold out last year (the ink that is, don't remember if the pen did as well).

 

[TwinQY]

Got Deep Sea in last week, loving the colour, flow, everything. Weather's been great lately so I might take a picture tomorrow morning. Also got in a 50mL bottle of Syo-ro recently. It's interesting that there are a lot of superb-performing inks in this colour range (well, Yama-Dori sometimes stains, but that seems to be from the saturation rather than the quality of the dye). Blue-blacks, greens, and things in between seem to exhibit better flow/lubrication overall. But I'm still of the opinion that teals bluer than Yama-Dori are akin to Beef Gurewitch. Don't eat it!

Also got in a full bottle of Grey Plum. Seems better flowing than my sample, also more saturated. More of a distinct KWZ smell too.

Wondering what to do with this bottle of Honey. Nothing to really ink it up with (needs a wet, smooth nib - even the C823 was not enough...). Plus, Lie de The basically fills any niche it would have filled (I got it under the impression that it would have been more velvety/lubricated than LdT, which flows fine but sort of has that raw feel to it).

Also, loving the Wing Sung 698s. Cheaper TWSBI Ecos without that "squared-off" look, more of a 580 clone. Plus, nib unit unscrews. Con - won't fit any fancy-pancy #6 nibs (not looking to do much, maybe just a stub). People have speculated that the tooling was bought off from whatever factory had been making the Pilot 78Gs (hence the 659s). The nibs are basically identical to the Pilot "Super Quality" nibs, but the pens don't seem to fit an actual Pilot "Super Quality". At least, not the one I tried (although I didn't try very hard). The nibs that they come with are pretty consistent though, I've had similar experiences with the Metro and Prera nibs. Super round blobby tipping plopped onto a nail, makes for smooth writing at any angle. I've kept two in the kitchen for quick jots. Have them inked with Kin-Mokusei and Chu-Shu (I think, apart from Yuki-Akari, Fuji-Musume, and Irori, I have the entire Four Season line, in either bottle or sample form).

Out of the 4 Wing Sung "Super Quality" nibs I've got, the 3 Fines (which correspond to the Pilot mediums) have been perfect, while the Extra-Fine (which correspond to the Pilot fines) has been a bit scratchy, at least a bit more so than my Prera Fs, but not terrible. Hard to get something at that nib width to go smoother, but I've experienced it in other pens.

I think I made a post about Sailor Nagasawa-Kobe #25 Tarumi Apricot a while back, and now that I've got Kin-Mokusei (which I recall saying that I would not get, might not have been on this forum), I find the latter to be basically Apricot (that's nothing new, but it is welcome). This comparison is a decent representation of the differences between the two: http://macchiatoman.com/blog/2016/9/10/ink-comparison-oranges. Although, #25 is less pink/has more shading in practice.

 

[some1x]

Got into the hobby too late. Omas already went out of business. Can't stop collecting them. Love the aesthetics and materials. The celluloid pens are beautiful beyond words. One thing I really like about Omas pistons is that they draw a maximum fill on first try (a lot of piston converters I've used only seem to get 70% fill on first try). Nib performance is really good. A couple I bought used needed slight adjustments (resetting feed and flossing the tines). Generally, Omas nibs are smoother, wetter, and have more interesting shading than my Sailor nibs. Favorite pens are the Ogiva Arco Brown and the Vintage Paragon Arco Verde. 
 

 

[Digitalis]

It is shame Omas went out of business, I have an Emotica which is a pen with a titanium nib with highly variable line width. For common writing I use a Lamy Safari, which does fine with an EF nib with Visconti blue ink. I have several other Lamy pens I use with nibs that go all the way to 1.9mm. I also have a fine selection of inks from Noodlers - Apache sunset is a personal favorite, I also got a set of CMY inks from noodlers so I can mix whichever colour I want - which is a lot of fun.

 

[RazorJack]

So glad that fountain pens are not extinct (yet?) !!!

I got two Lamy Safari's (red and black, both with a converter and fine nibs) and a Lamy 2000 (medium nib).

As for bottled ink, I got several from Akkerman.

German/Dutch pride

 

[RazorJack]

And here's a photo:

By the way, I changed the nibs. Black Safari now has M, red Safari has B, and 2000 also has B. Gotta love those thick lines!!

 

[RazorJack]

And some writing samples:



Written on Oxford 90 g Optik paper.

Notice how the 2000 B nib is significantly wider than the Safari B nib. I love both, but prefer the 2000. Smooth as silk!

 

[epocs]

Just wanted to let my fellow head-fiers know that I finally launched a pen that I've been working on creating for the past year. A side project that I hope you guys would enjoy
http://kck.st/2HRTrdZ

 

[pkshiu]

Just wanted to let my fellow head-fiers know that I finally launched a pen that I've been working on creating for the past year. A side project that I hope you guys would enjoy
http://kck.st/2HRTrdZ

Hi,

The pen looks interesting, but as a penaddict that has many of the kickstarter pens, I think you need to give a lot more details on KS about the pen. I went to your blog, and guess that the refill is the Schmitt 8126? Us pen people really care about refill compatibility. Think the techliner for example, it is a great pen, but more importantly it happens to use one of my favorite refill. Otherwise I would not have bought... 2 of them.

Are you coating brass? How well will that stand up to use? Can you show the pen posted? Where is the center of gravity? How many turns on the cap to cap/post? All that stuff matter to pen nerds

Thanks,
P.K.

 

[epocs]

Hi,

The pen looks interesting, but as a penaddict that has many of the kickstarter pens, I think you need to give a lot more details on KS about the pen. I went to your blog, and guess that the refill is the Schmitt 8126? Us pen people really care about refill compatibility. Think the techliner for example, it is a great pen, but more importantly it happens to use one of my favorite refill. Otherwise I would not have bought... 2 of them.

Are you coating brass? How well will that stand up to use? Can you show the pen posted? Where is the center of gravity? How many turns on the cap to cap/post? All that stuff matter to pen nerds

Thanks,
P.K.

I love how thoughtful you are about this! Definitely can answer a lot of those questions:

Yea it is the 8126, which I've found to really be the best ink I've ever used after testing all the G2s, various Monteverde, Montblanc, etc. refills. Definitely coating the brass. We did one coat before but it just wasn't enough to handle harder drops, so we're using 3 coats. I don't actually know the science behind the coating mechanisms that the coater is using, but it holds up incredibly well now.

Center of gravity is right at the center when unposted, and when posted, is again at the center, though obviously higher up in the pen with it posted. Should be comfortable for some folks who write higher up on the pen, and better without the cap for those who write close to the tip.

Turns on the post is about 2 rotations, both on the back and as well as on the tip. The photos show the threads as more (3.5 turns), but it's something we changed recently to accommodate an easier use.

Also, I think there should be some photos up on the KS with it posted in case you're curious! Thanks again for your thoughtfulness, this is the sort of stuff I've been thinking about a ton.

 

[JefferyRW]

As long as I'm pumping out this self-indulgent schiit, I might as well get into a seperate topic that's been swimming in my head. Iroshizuku inks. Everyone seems to like them. I'm not sure why I don't have any at the moment, apart from Kosomosu. I like them, and I advocate for them, but I don't have more than one bottle? How did that work out? Like R&K inks, I like the palette of colours as a whole, they are very clean, not murky (like how I find some Noodlers colours, and a couple of other brands to be), and I like the ink properties (flows like water, nice saturation), and I like the bottles, both the 50mL and the 15mL. I think it is due to: other inks already in my arsenal, or are more accessible to buy, that have prevented me from getting these; the individual colours not being as enticing as the idea of them altogether as a collective. Here's a list of each of the Iros and how I've justified not getting a bottle of the respective colour (as of yet). A couple of these I've based my opinon on usage from samples, most others from swabs IRL (thanks to our local shop, Vancouver Pen Shop), and have supplemented everything by viewing swabs and photos online (to jog my memory).

TwinQY,

I'd like to thank you for the utter abandon and passion with which you share your observations and insights, particularly regarding ink. As a fan of Iroshizuku inks, I found your descriptions accurate and informative. Your comments on other Japanese inks have provoked me to look outside my comfy barricade of Iroshizuku bottles and explore a bit more. However, this is primarily a note, as I say above, of thanks to you and others who put so much into sharing your experiences and discoveries.

It's inspiring.

 

[JefferyRW]

Repair Question: I have a Shaeffer fountain pen that I'm quite fond of and which recently lost a piece of the sleeve connecting the barrel to the nib mechanism (see below). Any suggestions on repairing options? Thank you in advance.

 

[some1x]

Collection of Omas faceted pens.The vintage paragon size (2nd and 3rd from left) is my favorite of the bunch. The vintage extra (5th pen) has the nicest writing nib (flexy 14k with very well defined lines).

 

[some1x]

Picked up an old Tabo pen, much too small to my liking, but the nib is wonderful.