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I'm glad I found this thread! I thought that fountain pens would be way more obsure than they are. My girlfriend just bought me a fountain pen as a gift, a Cross Classic Century. I enjoy writing with it, I like how slim and light it is; I've been reading this thread and others and I have some concerns though. Apparently it can only accept the Cross slim ink cartridges, no converters (made by Cross, at least) will fit it. Is that the case, or has anyone here had any experience otherwise?
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Oct 23, 2014 14:59
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This is my first fountain pen, and admittedly the sentimentality of the gift plays a role in wanting to use it. I like the way it writes and feels, I just don't like the ink at all (which is I guess a known issue with Cross inks). I watched a bunch of videos from the Goulet Pen Company about cleaning pens and refilling cartridges, so I'll give that spin. Looking at the cartridges, they seem to have a pretty straightforward, flimsy friction based coupling so I don't have a ton of hope for how well they'll work for re-use. I also bought a Metro, because that's the consensus literally everywhere, and a bottle of Noodlers Black Bulletproof because of basically the same thing. Those should be here by Saturday so I look forward to playing with new toys!
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Oct 23, 2014 16:52
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My Pilot Metropolitan showed up and I took it for a test drive. Comparison with the Cross pen and ink I had received are here. I love writing with the Cross because it was a gift and I'm sentimental, but god drat what a difference the right pen and ink makes.
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Oct 25, 2014 23:39
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What do you guys do about the piston stem after you rinse out an Ahab? I got one to tinker with, but I can't figure out what I can jam up in there to dry it out and use it with different inks more quickly.
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Nov 15, 2014 21:47
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Korwen posted:This might be weird, but I take the breather tube, stick it up there, and blow through it to dislodge all the water that gets stuck up there. I ended up threading some cotton twine in it, letting it absorb the water and then letting it air dry.
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Nov 17, 2014 02:22
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It looks like the stipula can't be disassembled to allow for fully flushing all of the bits, so the converter is kind of permanently attached. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, it just means it will be more tedious to clean it.
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Nov 24, 2014 23:28
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/\/\/\/\ I would also say that Noodler's pen's are exactly what you're looking for, except they are absolutely a tinkerer's pen. If you want something the writes perfectly out of the box they're terrible for your needs. If you want a pen that you treat like the carb on your first Chevelle so you sometimes manually adjust it at red lights, it's a great fun pen that writes great and is cheap as poo poo.blowfish posted:Wait, it's not even a crappy piston pen? It is a piston fill, but the piston is part of the body itself. So you have to fill and dump it a billion times to get it clean. Does anyone here know of a dot grid lined, fountain pen friendly, top spiral bound notebook? The Rhodia dotpad paper is tits, but MY GIRLFRIEND would prefer a top spiral bind over a top staple bind.
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Nov 25, 2014 17:36
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Brightman posted:So I got in on a Lamy 2000 for half off Massdrop thing several weeks to a month ago and it has had some crazy poo poo happen to the point it is like a Kickstarter project. Lamy apparently sent all 234 pens to a random person in Iowa instead of the Massdrop distribution place, and now we're waiting on a reshipment. Although they're now including a bottle of Lamy black ink, so that's good. Still, that means someone in Iowa received about $40k in pens. Maybe it was another customer but I really hope it was just a random person that's super confused now. Any idea where in Iowa? That's where I live, and I need to make a new friend from the sounds of things.
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Nov 30, 2014 06:55
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The Hebug posted:Back in stock on JetPens today (I grabbed a bottle). Only 14 left as of typing this, FYI.
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Dec 5, 2014 19:24
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Alder posted:Italic nibs are nice but there's no need to pay much for it as many FP companies offer calligraphy sets too. Some examples would be Sheaffer No-nonense, Pilot Parallel, and Manuscript FPs. I suggest sets unless you have a nib preference and line variation is more noticeable in greater widths. Doesn't the Plumix nib fit the Metro as well?
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Dec 7, 2014 17:59
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I'm a trainer for an insurance company, and two of my new agents showed up today with brand new Metropolitans and questions about inks. 
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Dec 8, 2014 23:34
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404notfound posted:It's here! It's here! I ordered mine 12/5 from JetPens and it's listed as "packaging" in my order status. e: VVVV yeah, knowing that you ordered on the 4th makes me feel a bit better. I ordered right before I posted here about there being 14 bottles left in stock at JP. They probably just didn't get to processing the order until today. NeurosisHead fucked around with this message at 01:22 on Dec 9, 2014 |
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Dec 9, 2014 01:08
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Edmond Dantes posted:Speaking of Stormy Grey, it's back in stock over at Goulet Pens. I just got the email too. Hooray for someone other than me who hasn't ordered it already from somewhere else.
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Dec 9, 2014 20:27
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Mikl posted:Quick question! Grey ink: which one? Should I just go for Stormy Grey? If not, Kiri-same or Fuyo-syogun? I love Fuyu-syogun, it's an almost silver grey in a wet nib, and really nails the "wintry" grey feel. Noodler's Lexington Grey looks pretty much like marks from a graphite pencil, if that's your thing. De Atrementis e: I've got J. Herbin on the brain, the De Atrmentis is Fog Grey. herp derp NeurosisHead fucked around with this message at 20:46 on Dec 10, 2014 |
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Dec 10, 2014 19:40
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My TWSBI mini EF nib is running kind of dry; I want to take it apart and clean the channel, but I can't tell if the nib and feed are pressure fit in the collar or not. Trying to tug it apart, there was enough resistance to tell me that they're cemented, but I might just be a huge man baby or maybe just missing the trick to them coming apart. Stephen Brown says they're pressure and just pops them apart, but they sure don't act like it for me. Do you guys have any experience with them?
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Dec 11, 2014 07:03
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grack posted:They're friction fit but very tight. Screw out the nib assembly and soak it in warm (not hot!) water for about 5-6 minutes, screw it back in to the pen. Then, take a piece of non-adhesive shelf liner (the rubbery stuff with holes in it), and while gripping the sides of the nib just keep gently pulling and wiggling it back and forth and it should pop out. Thanks for this! I'll give it a whirl tonight and see how it goes. I bought a Nib Creeper to use with the Stormy Grey ink so it wouldn't trash my TWSBI 1.1mm italic; if I can just take the nib and feed apart to clean it effectively(I don't trust a flush to get the gold out of it) that poo poo is going in my TWSBI asap. Or I could just get the Goulet 1.1mm and stick it in one of my Ahabs. So much options!
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Dec 11, 2014 22:48
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Follow up to previous, they are friction fit, and the soak and disconnect worked wonderfully. I smashed a couple of the fins off of the underside while I fiddled with it; but it turns out that they don't seem to serve any purpose at all! Hooray, time to play with my Stormy Grey! e: another follow up, drat this stuff is sparkly. I think that the feed channel on the TWSBI feed isn't robust enough to handle how goopy this ink is. It's fine for other inks so I'm not going to carve it up though - my Nib Creeper should be here tomorrow though so I won't mind messing that up with it! NeurosisHead fucked around with this message at 06:40 on Dec 12, 2014 |
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Dec 12, 2014 05:29
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Remora posted:I love-hate doing Goulet orders because it starts out very reasonable -- "I want to find a blue-black ink I really love, let's get some samples" -- and then I just see one or two things -- "I really want to put a broad nib in my Konrad, and the Goulet one is just $15, and hey there's a pen I want on Bottom Shelf, and they got that bottle of ink I've been waiting on back in stock" -- and it just mushrooms and it's two in the morning and I have $200 of poo poo in my cart and I don't know what happened but I need to clean this poo poo up before my better half sees what I've been doing all night. My girlfriend is out of town for work; I told her that I got my Stormy Grey and that I got a nib creeper to play with it in. She stopped me, and said "wait, where did the nib creeper come from? Goulet?! Check with me before you order next time so I can have you grab some things from my wishlist!" In addition, the training class I have right now did their non-denominational holiday gift exchange today. Two more new agents had requested fountain pens, that's 4/10 that my monumental dork enthusiasm about fountain pens has inspired.
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Dec 13, 2014 05:38
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rio posted:Bought another Ahab to replace the one I irreversibly damaged; this time a clear demo which looks badass. Still smells like plastic barf poo poo and that unfortunately is part of the writing experience since that is all I can smell while using it. Washed it with diluted dish water before even using it and it helped minimally. I've done a lot of playing with nibs and feeds on my ahab, here's a couple of things that I have found:
Other than that, heat setting the nib and feed (especially if you modding or just switching out nibs, Goulet has a good video about it, it isn't very hard at all) makes a world of difference. This seems to be everyone's favorite flex mod for Ahabs. I don't know that it really needs one, because you're never going to turn it into a 14k wet noodle no matter what you do.
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Dec 17, 2014 02:39
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In the recommended videos was the clip from one of the Expendables movies where that pen has a cameo. In that scene, Ole Sly whips out his MURDERPEN (which the camera takes a few seconds to have a close up on), and one of the other meat mountains says "Jeez, do you own anything that isn't covered in skulls?" Then they laugh. I think that line might have not been scripted, because Stallone wrote those movies and his character is basically his own perfect power fantasy self insert. And I think everything that The Italian Stallion owns might actually be covered in skulls, given his design aesthetics.
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Dec 17, 2014 21:19
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Zorblack posted:I would gladly buy the Chaos Skull Insanity pen for upwards of $100, but my mind is simultaneously melted and blown by its actual price. holy loving dicks
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Dec 18, 2014 00:06
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The TWSBI Mini is a nice little short pen too, and a piston filler!
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Dec 26, 2014 05:04
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Mikl posted:I have a Metro with a CON-50 converter, and so do my mom and my sister. All fit really snug, without any noticeable "give" when I jiggle them. Could be either the converter or the pen, but if your Metro doesn't have any problem with ink cartridges (i.e.: leakage of some sort), I'd say it's a defective converter. The Havana from Quo Vadis and the Webnotebook from Rhodia are both similar (with vastly higher quality paper). I believe both are available from Goulet Pen Company.
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Jan 23, 2015 15:20
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Alder posted:Eh, the Optima feels a little too busy for me. It reminds me of my grail pen Omas but too much decoration going on the cap bands. Also they cost multiple thousands of dollars. God drat if they aren't the one pen you can guarantee no one else will have though (because they're individually hand made by master craftsmen in glorious Nippon  )
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Jan 23, 2015 16:42
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Mikl posted:Just buy a low-end pen with a compatible nib: the Plumix, Penmanship and Kakuno are good for pulling out the nib and tossing the rest, and are all compatible with the Metro. The Plumix has a 1mm italic if that's your thing (doubtful, since you said you use it for work), while the Penmanship is Extra Fine and the Kakuno comes in F and M (both with a smile). You could also consider getting a Jinhao X750 ($10) and then trying different #6 nibs in it. Although I suppose that if you're spending $15 per nib from Goulet just buying cheap Pilots is actually more cost effective. Noodler's sells their untipped #6 nibs for about $1 a piece. You could get a mess of those, some wire cutters and nib tuning stuff and start playing with custom grinds. That and an Ahab for the ebonite feed and you've got a real cheap tinkerer's option for interchangeable nibs. Unless you're really into loving around with your pens, I'd just get the low end Pilot's for their nibs to put in a Metro. If you're interested in the endless fiddling of a Noodler's Pen though, here's Nathan talking about the nib fiddling: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG6_4GK8QCE
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Jan 26, 2015 01:45
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Swagger Dagger posted:I literally just got done using my F Pilot Metropolitan to line some graphs for a probability class so they're not a bad idea, at least on decent paper where the ink won't soak in and spread. This might be even better, although I don't use it for notes since it has trouble starting in the middle of a sentence sometimes: http://smile.amazon.com/dp/B006CQUHXG/ref=sr_ph?ie=UTF8&qid=1422417116&sr=1&keywords=pilot+fountain+pen+extra+fine That body looks almost exactly like a Plumix body.
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Jan 28, 2015 05:16
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Dylanthulhu posted:My friend gifted me a Pilot Metro because he's a nice guy. I've got a bottle of Noodler's Black Eel coming in the mail. I'm wondering if goons can recommend me a dark green? Looking for a bit darker than this. http://www.gouletpens.com/N19039/p/N19039 I'm a big fan of this as a distinctly green near black color.
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Feb 6, 2015 18:28
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stimulated emission posted:My boyfriend has one of these and his birthday is coming up: http://www.lamyusa.com/lamy_fountain_L17_safari.php And here's a link to buy them from Goulet.
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Feb 7, 2015 00:40
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Slimchandi posted:FWIW I love my Lamy studio in brushed steel more than my Metro and safari. I much prefer the round section to that of the safari. Plus comes with a converter. The flex in no way compares to a vintage gold nib, but you can't go wrong for the price. You've got an ebonite feed, your choice of #6 nibs, and a durable body you can easily breakdown to clean. Where the pen really shines is as a tinker's pen; you can pretty much infinitely fiddle with the nib and feed and different nibs to get it to write exactly the way you want it to.
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Feb 7, 2015 16:03
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Mecca-Benghazi posted:Tore through this thread over the weekend, now I have an order from Goulet for a violet Pilot Metro and a Rhodia notepad. Thanks. There's a specific nib grind for arabic writing, since it tends to have wide horizontals and narrow verticals making it the exact opposite of western writing. An oblique nib is kind of close, I guess, but not spot on. If you just want to keep it as fine and legible as possible without capturing the character of the line weights the medium would be fine, but the fine might be better depending on how heavy your hand is.
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Feb 9, 2015 06:13
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Anybody have any experience with the FPR Triveni's? I was looking at my pen collection and realized that I don't actually have a red pen, so I decided to take a gamble and got one of the Triveni Juniors in mottled red ebonite with a flex nib. Their flex nibs are supposed to write at the same width as their EF nibs when you're not flexing (Noodler's nibs tend to be like that too in my experience) so it seemed like the best bang for my buck. With the whole thing clocking in at like $35 or so I feel pretty confident in my purchase, but I thought I'd see if anyone here has any first hand opinions about them. e: Bulleit is pretty good boubon. If you can get it try Cedar Ridge, that's my current favorite.
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Feb 13, 2015 06:52
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Greg Minuskin posted that he's got a lot of awesome vintage flex pens from the LA Pen Show that he'll be offering up for sale in the near future. I'm pretty excited about that.
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Feb 14, 2015 18:13
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if this is the pen, it looks like a Varsity shaped nib that's the size of a Preppy nib. At the end of the day they're all ~$3.00 pens with steel nibs, so I don't imagine they're very different. The only thing that I would speculate about is that it's probably more of a nail like a Preppy, given that it's a shorter nib overall. /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\e: I've still never managed to get in on one of his flash pen sales (those things sell in less than 10 minutes sometimes, and I've got a job damnit). I highly doubt I'll get in on anything from whatever he's purchased now, but the pictures will be neat to look at on his site. NeurosisHead fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Feb 14, 2015 |
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Feb 14, 2015 20:07
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Soylent Yellow posted:So it seems that I was drunk in control of an ebay account a few days ago. A 10-pack of Hero 616s dropped through my letterbox today. The first one I try doesn't fill properly. I'm sure I can find a workable pen in the other 9. I'm pretty sure a 10% usable rate is about normal for Hero pens, so you're about where you should be if that's the case. So I mentioned that I was excited about what Greg Minuskin put up for sale after the LA Pen Show. I lucked out, and nabbed this beauty just now. I don't know what it is about the pearl white, but I absolutely fell in love with it when I saw it. What is wrong with me?
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Feb 17, 2015 02:16
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I love my TWSBI mini, and I abuse the poo poo of this pen. Still no structural problems with it. It's too bad that TWSBI has such big component level QA issues, because that's prevented my from buying other products from them for fear of not getting this lucky on round 2. 
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Feb 18, 2015 19:46
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I pick a pen to match my tie, either with the body as a complement or the ink as a contrast.
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Feb 19, 2015 02:32
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AnimalChin posted:drat it all, mine did this too. The other side of TWSBI's notorious quality issues is the fact that they'll send you new components free of charge if you email them about it.
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Feb 19, 2015 21:40
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AnimalChin posted:Emailed them a picture of my broken pen. The response was that I twisted the piece on too tight (I didn't) and that they would be happy to ship me a replacement part but that they were out of them and to check back in a few weeks. The time table on the follow up is unfortunate, but that they'll do it for free is good. It would be better if they didn't have to do it at all, but that's irrelevant now. You can buy a replacement nib unit in any size from EF to 1.5mm from Goulet for $20 if you're feeling impatient. e: now that I think about it, they're trying to get the Eco out in a couple of months, I'm not surprised that there's some component shortages for their previous models while they focus on the launch of a new product line in the last stages.
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Feb 20, 2015 22:27
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Keep in mind that iron gall inks can be really, really hard on nibs and feeds.
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Feb 23, 2015 22:26
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grack posted:This really isn't true for modern iron gall inks except with certain Lamy pens. I disagree. It's pretty acidic, and I've seen first hand what it can do to a pilot metro nib over about 6 months. Iron gall is acidic and is rough on steel (gold is mostly ok though, being corrosion resistant), and some bright inks (baystate from Noodler's) are really alkaline, and rough on plastics and celluloids.
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Feb 23, 2015 22:56
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