The EDC thread had a diversion into the world of fountain pens caused by @fitterstoke calling out the HongDian M2 as a great value Kaweco Sport alternative. A couple of other M2 owners sung it’s praise and at least 3 were ordered.
So there are a few of pen enthusiasts here (there are other terms but some of them sound quite sinister) and I wondered what ink you use and recommend?
I have some cartridges for my Kaweco (some black and some grey) and a bottle of black Lamy ink for my Lamy fountain pen. A quick search on theinternet suggests that there is at least as much conversation around ink and colour as there is about pens.
So – what do you use and why? And which bottles have the best way of avoiding (or minimising) and inky end?
Before I had my very nice Cross fountain pen stolen I had turquoise cartridges for it. Probably signifies some unpleasant personality disorder these days but when I was at school ink pens were mandatory and turquoise ink was the rebel’s colour as opposed to the conventional pupils with their black and blue. Parker, obvs. So I stuck with it.
Ha ha! I found a half-used bottle of turquoise Quink while at school and used it until it ran out. Its rebellious qualities went unremarked by my various teachers. These days I use Midnight Blue Mont Blanc ink for my Meisterstuck 149.
Cripes! My first car cost less than that!
Never mind the ink @rufus-t-firefly I was given some Mont Blanc ink and a pen as a gift some time ago, and it would get much more use if the ink was not so damn inky it bled through to the next page. So a suggestion for a notepad that is substantial enough not to bleed through.
Rhodia, perhaps? Not cheap, but high quality and lots of sizes, big and small.
Definitely Rhodia for me too. They are substantial enough for fountain pens @moselymoles, but I mainly use a (Mont Blanc) ballpoint for my work.
Leuchtturm 1917 notebooks are very good for fountain pens. The paper is a good weight and ink bleed is minimal to non existent. Much better than Moleskine
Numbered pages and a contents page too.
Not inexpensive but still just about worth the £15 to £20 they want. I’m fond of the softcover ones.
Indeed – I use a Leuchtturm 1917 diary/notebook every day. Not cheap, as you say – but for a once a year purchase? And definitely better than Moleskine!
Mine too! (terrible K reg Fiat 128). I’ve had this pen since around 1980. A few years later it escaped from my pocket when I was running to get on a plane and the barrel cracked. I think Dunhill handled MB in those days, so I took it to their service place in Brentwood. The repair, plus a service and polish were all done free of charge because, “Mont Blancs shouldn’t leak”.
Diamine Inks.
Beautiful colours and combinations. Nothing wrong with Washable Blue, Black and Blue-Black, but I’m currently writing with Diamine Mediterranean Blue and Diamine Hope Pink.
Amazon (as bloody always) sell 30ml bottles in packs of eight.
Diamine Green-Black is next to try.
A pack of 8?
*goes of to Amazon*
Packs of 6. Apologies.
I got excited
I assumed so. Have bought the following: Amber, Oxblood, Imperial Purple, Aurora Borealis, Oxford Blue, Meadow.
Nice.
Excellent choices.
I have the three mentioned above plus Classic Red, Sepia, Ancient Copper, Earl Grey, Twilight and Jet Black.
I might spring for that six pack you’ve just bought aswell.
They’ll all get used. I write a lot of notes. My notepads are very pleasing to look at if not to actually read through.
Don’t you have to go through the tiresome process of washing the nib out before changing inks?
Yep. And it is tiresome, but it goes with the lifestyle of us renegade, pink ink using rebels.
😁
Also, I have a lot of pens which I’ll leave inked up in certain colours so nib flushing isn’t too much of a bind
I have a Parker Sonnet fountain pen which I’ve used for years with black Quink cartridges. I also have a couple of matching Sonnet roller ball pens which are so much nicer to write with than ballpoints, one blue ink, one black.
Quink was always the ink of choice at school and I still have a couple of bottles of Royal Blue and Black. This Mont Blanc bottle was the last one I got, which has the advantage of letting you dip your pen in not too deep, but having a steady reservoir of ink to tip up into the drinking space:
But sadly, given that I use a fountain pen partly to avoid the waste of disposable pens, I find the almost unavoidable mess of refilling means I now prefer a simple cartridge of the generic type. The advantage of these is, I can easily swap colours if I want (though I rarely see the need for red or green or turquoise inks):
All of which begs the question under what circumstances do you feel the need for violet ink and why?
(I rather like a violet ink: J.Herbin Violette Pensée, since you ask…)
Black cartridges for me. Austere and boring that’s me.
At the violet hour, when I go to the Wasteland floorshow to listen to violent sounds with Tiresias, a typist and a sailor we met on the way.
Letters to the local paper about closing skate parks and young people being noisy perchance?
Green ink for that, shurely?
But which shade of green?
Well, I use Parker Penman Emerald for the purpose…
Teal.
Personally, I think niche topics like pen ink have no place on this forum. The AW should be for music and Wordle only.
And poignant tales of a childhood in the north east of Scotland
And a little bit of politics
And a smattering of modern culture like TV and movies
And nice places to go in Sicily (where we are going in a month’s time)
And whatever technical problem Junior can’t solve today
And what’s the weather like where you are
But definitely no pen ink
ps I had to sign a cheque the other day – I’ve forgotten how to write, in the end I just squiggled…
I just squiggled seems to be your Wordle strategy as well.
That would have looked so much nicer in Mediterranean Blue.
The US company Noodler’s has inks in the most astonishing range of colours.
Apache sunset, Black Swan in Australian Roses, Brexit(!), Rome Burning, Socrates, Purple Mountain Majesties, Sun Never Sets, Kiowa Pecan, Dragon’s Napalm, Squeteague, Bad Belted Kingfisher, Widow Maker, Hellfire, Q’Eternity, and countless others.
Feast your eyes, ink fans!
https://www.purepens.co.uk/collections/noodlers
also in future discussions: my kanban board set-up, is bullet journalling right for you and my four-hour morning routine including rubbing banana skins on face etc etc. Let the niche lifestyle posts flourish.
https://www.timesnownews.com/health/fitness-influencer-ashton-halls-wellness-routine-goes-viral-know-the-benefits-of-ice-water-dipping-and-banana-peels-article-119567715
Bring it on, having had the joys of skincare, um, “persuaded” upon me of late, finding the ritual and routine of it. Especially as I now get told I don’t look a day under 70*.
*I am 403 days under 70.
Surely these are all you need.
Mostly I use Diamine inks: particularly Prussian Blue (in my Parker Duofold); Skull and Roses Blue (a royal blue with a prominent red sheen); various greys; and some of the Cult Pens “Deep Dark” specials. Oh, and Sherwood Green – my “go to” when I was at work and still in use at home.
Also some J Herbin inks: mostly Bleu Myosotis, Bleu des Profondeurs and Violette Pensée. I have one of the Pilot Iroshizuku inks (kind of dark teal) and two from Kyoto Inks (pictured) – very nice…
I draw with a Schneider. It’s cartridges are fine, but I’ve discovered this evening that they’re not waterproof.
My day to day is a Pilot Varsity black ink.
If I’m feeling fancy, Quink BlueBlack
My current every day, “go to” favourite is Diamine Graphite.
Which, I suppose, begs the question: why not just use a pencil?
What do people write with such pens and ink? I only use a pen these days to scrawl notes at work
I’ve hesitated to ask that question (says the retiree who can just about manage a squiggled signature on a cheque with a Biro he found buried in his “workstation”). WTAF are they writing? Love letters to each other admiring the length of their nibs? Are they all members of a Secret Society which one day will find the Fountain Pen To Rule Us All ?
Don’t think I have used a fountain pen since I was about 12. I do think it is something of a lost art though. But I am no longer writing “frightening verse to a buck-toothed girl in Luxemburg”
I make notes a lot whilst working – on calls etc. Also, in meetings, I try to avoid using my laptop – it is often a distraction and find a piece of paper less distracting. I’ve tried to do list apps and my problem is I don’t look at them as much as I do a piece of paper on my desk.
If I am writing, I find it more pleasing to do it with a nice/interesting pen and fountain pens are that for me. I think it makes me look sexier, more atractive to women and more inteligent to boot. Only the ink stain on my nice blue jacket reflects the downside of a fountain pen.
Damn, if only you could spell intelligant…
I’m torn between taking credit for an undeniably corny but amusing gaffe or just fessing up to a typo due to the fact I am both crap at typing and, invariably, doing something else at the same time.
To all intents this for me too.
I make a lot of notes at work. Lists, reminders, summaries, draft reports. All for my own use. It’s so much easier to write it down longhand than to type up a note on a keyboard. They’re all to hand on the same notebook on my literal desktop rather than on file on a home drive. IT isn’t necessarily more effective or efficient.
Plus, I’ve always found writing by hand quite pleasing, ever since school. I have decent handwriting and I like to keep it up to snuff.
More recently I’ve started keeping what I suppose I need to call a diary. It’s more a list of personal aide memoires but I will sometimes dig a little deeper and write Some Meaningful Thoughts. I’ve mentioned£ here before that my older brother is slipping badly into dementia and we’re encouraging him to try note keeping for himself. I’ve taken on the habit for myself.
All of this takes ink through a fountain pen. Which I have always preferred to a biro, again ever since school. The more interesting and vivid the colours the better. They can quite literally brighten up a day’s work.
I take detailed notes from most books I am reading, as I find it a good way of reinforcing the learning from the material. Also, it makes me slow down and avoid skim reading, particularly if I’m using a nib pen.
Plus, it’s more sustainable, innit?
There is a pleasure in manual acts* that crummy typing and swiping can never replicate or replace.
*Oh for a Moose of fire…
Of course, you don’t have to write with them…
Very good
Thanks – I’ve just started, really. El Hombro Malo mentioned a “Sketch a Day” app in the blogger takeover. I can’t draw for toffee – so of course I signed up!
I wish I could draw. I bought a book and did some exercises but I didn’t keep it up. I guess it’s one of those things I wish I could do but not too the point of making any effort to learn how to do it.
I get the dislike of biro’s, but, given the choice, however much the aesthetic of nib and ink appeals, I find rollerballs my preference. I write notes as I listen to records I am reviewing, it so much easier than typing.
In our local supermarket you can buy a rollerball/ ballpoint pen that takes standard ink cartridges (and potentially a filler) for less than 10 Euros. Never needs to be thrown away like a regular Bic does.
Usually black, sometimes blue if I can’t find a black pen. Any other colour is an extravagance use by those artistic types
After making my throwaway comment, I was idly thinking…..
I seem to remember at school it was always blue pens that were used, never black. How did blue ink come to be so prevalent – I would think that all printed media (newspapers, etc) have always used black type and most “proper writing” (i.e quils, fountain pens, calligraphy) always seem to be black ink. How did blue ballpoint / roller ball / etc pens become so ubiquitous?
Related to this: I mentioned J Herbin’s Bleu Myosotis ink further up. Apparently, when the French school system still used scratchy dip pens and ink wells, this colour was the standard ink for all the state schools.
Will there be a blotting paper thread too?
Calling all the Molesworths and Merry Pranksters ‘out there’.
Especially for you @dai.
https://www.hamiltonpens.com/collections/blotters/products/esterbrook-blotting-paper
This is what I had to use in my last job as a wedding registrar.
Diamine Registrar`s Ink is a permanent archival blue-black iron gall ink which can be used in fountain pens. Do not use in valuable pens and regular flushing out is recommended . It is acidic, which could damage steel nibs. Use with caution, and at your own risk.
A job for a dip pen? Or a quill??
A fountain pen, though a quill could have been fun.
A sudden rush of memory has me mindful of stating at prep school, inkwell in the desk and, if not a quill, certainly no more than a nib on a stick, for dipping and writing.
Oh yes. It’s all coming back to me now. The ultra-basic “nib-on-a-stick” pens that were offered to us were these:
https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/221594-the-platignum-school-cartridge-pen/
Oho! Someone else peruses Fountain Pen Network…
Lawks, no, nothing that dangled or useful. These were nibs attached to a solid rod. You dipped and used as much ink as you could get on the nib, and then dipped again.