Fountain pens - anyone write?

Oh man, yes they are a functional passion of mine. I use them A LOT for drawing/sketching for work. I’m a big Pelikan fan

M1005 demonstrator
M805 custom Binder nib
vintage NN

for more affordable workhorse pens I really like Pilot
custom 92
custom 742 FA

A couple Twsbi as well.

get some good paper and it’s a great experience
 
The best pen I ever owned for actual writing was a vintage Conway Stewart with a 12 or 14 carat gold flexible nib. The nib was lovely and most of all it was really flexible allowing me to write in the old copperplate style with thick and thin lines that provided wonderful flourishes in the writing. None of my other pens have done that - all nibs I have tried are much harder and less pleasant to write with. In looks it was similar to the one below. Conway Stewarts were nothing special back in the day - in fact I am sure they were often sold as students' pens. But I have tried finding one again (mine was lost at work probably dropped in someone's office and obviously some "colleague" now has it) but proper replacement all depends on the gold nib and with gold the price it is..............................

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I remember using Sheaffer cartridge pens in high school and college in the ‘60’s. For exams I always carried extra cartridges. And now, though I have some very nice pens, Sailor 1911 in Key Lime, a white 3776 Century, and a green Columbus and others, I have Lamy Al Stars in five or six different colors and I take one to work every day I go in and I carry a box of cartridges. The colors from the Lamy inks are unique and distinctive to indicate to me for instance, whether I have ordered an item and its options accurately from the manufacturer, and if I need to recheck my work I just use another color. I really enjoy using these pens. I have a red Al Star with Lamy red ink I do the NY Times crossword with!
 
Got a bunch. Maybe more than cameras. Lol. Lots of cheapies, but I do have a few that are nice. Old Parker Sonnet with a gold nib from the early 90s. Writes like butta. I have a rare Mont Blanc Noir et Noir. Never use that one. Bunch of other cheaper ones. The pick of the litter for the cheaper pens is the Kaweko Sport converted to an eyedropper. Ink for days. The gold coating is almost completely worn off the nib. Bizarrely enough my most reliable, never dries out, pen is a tiny Pilot Petit 1 that I picked up for $3 years ago and use as an eyedropper. I keep it in the darkroom and even after sitting for six months, writes on the first stroke. Remarkable. Can't say that for most of the rest. It is funny how the cheapies can often be the best. Go figure.

I kind of wish the Zebra nibs were permanent and could be used in a pen. Those are perfect for me, but not worth the hassle of converting to a pen. Gold comes next but those are pricey these days. I have a Summit 125 with a nice gold nib that needs a sack. That might be a nice writer if I ever get around to re-sacking it.
 
I bought this from some glass maker on a river cruise in Germany. I use it to sign things with. Cannot remember the name of the maker but the demonstrations of glass blowing were fascinating.
 

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spb_ch said:
I bought this from some glass maker on a river cruise in Germany. I use it to sign things with. Cannot remember the name of the maker but the demonstrations of glass blowing were fascinating.
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I have a similar blown-glass pen from Murano. The nib part is clear, like yours, and the handle part is solid green.

It's a lovely pen and it writes much more smoothly than dipping pen nibs punched out of steel.

- Murray
 
The first pay check I ever got where I had to wear a suit to work I bought a $400 Waterman fountain pen. That was 30 years ago. It’s sitting right in front of me. I’ll give it to my son. The second pay check went to a Vance motorcycle leather jacket which I had already given to my other son. I bought the pen thinking I would use it but in reality it was the typewriter followed by WordPerfect and then MS Office. I don’t believe I have manually handwritten anything other than scribble rude drawings at boring meeting. The pen is mint in box and my penmanship and spelling skills shot to shit.
 
Funny. I just bought a LAMY Safari fountain pen since I find myself using the analog writing process more and more these days. It's great to carry around and not have to worry about it. I have another "nice" Cross fountain pen which I bought ages ago from a stationary store that was going out of business...it was so inexpensive, it was practically free. But now the pendulum has swung in the other direction, and prices have gone back up on these classic writing instruments. I think it triggers a different part of the brain to write with a pen or a typewriter over a computer...not sure why, but I find my thought process very different depending on the medium.

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FloridaGhostPhoto said:
Funny. I just bought a LAMY Safari fountain pen since I find myself using the analog writing process more and more these days. It's great to carry around and not have to worry about it. I have another "nice" Cross fountain pen which I bought ages ago from a stationary store that was going out of business...it was so inexpensive, it was practically free. But now the pendulum has swung in the other direction, and prices have gone back up on these classic writing instruments. I think it triggers a different part of the brain to write with a pen or a typewriter over a computer...not sure why, but I find my thought process very different depending on the medium.
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It is because when you apply ink to paper it is permanent. Typing in a computer we know deep down that we can (and always do) go back later to "finish" the writing. Or the writing just gets lost in the computer ether.

Whenever I have something important like an idea to write down, I used a typewriter. Facit 1620. It puts all my good ideas in one place which helps enormously.
 
PRJ said:
It is because when you apply ink to paper it is permanent.
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So true, PRJ! It reminds me of The Typewriter Revolution's Manifesto which reads, in pertinent part, "we choose...the physical over the digital...the durable over the unsustainable." The trick, of course, is writing it right the first time!

That sounds like a nice machine, the Facit 1620. I just watched a YouTube video about it. I've never used a Facit machine...now I'll have to keep an eye out. I have three Smith Coronas and an Adler J5. My fave is that little Skyriter in the background. I'm going to have to stop myself here, though, for I'm wandering dangerously close to being an off-topic hijacker. 😎
 
CMur12 said:
I have a similar blown-glass pen from Murano. The nib part is clear, like yours, and the handle part is solid green.

It's a lovely pen and it writes much more smoothly than dipping pen nibs punched out of steel.

- Murray
Click to expand...

In my experience 99% of steel nibs are awful - stiff, inflexible, unresponsive to pressure and often scratchy. Not all but most. On the other hand, if you can find a vintage gold nib (at a price that does not require selling your kids for medical experiments) they are like chalk and cheese compared with steel nibs.

Having said that I think the problem with steel nibs is not that it is impossible to make a good steel nib but makers are not really interested in doing so. I recall as a kid writing with an old pen (not a fountain pen) of the sort that had to be dipped in the ink every couple of words. These nibs, once broken-in were flexible and wrote beautifully if you had the skill. But they did require replacing regularly as they wore out with use. Which was not a problem back then as the nibs for them were once cheap and readily available and replacement was the work of moments.

Today, pens are regarded as foibles these days including fountain pens and I suspect that fountain pens come in one of two types - either cheap devices relatively badly made in China usually (though some are not too bad especially if serviced by a knowledgeable owner) all of which essentially have the same nibs - hard as rock and inflexible. Or they (fountain pens) are expensive toys for people like me who wanted an expensive toy. The maker of neither type of fountain pen is, these days, interested in making a pen with a nib that is actually a joy to use out of the box.

BTW for anyone really interested, fountain pen nibs can be tuned and adjusted or even modified. I have done this myself following some internet research. But you do need to accept the risk of damaging the nib / pen if you get over enthusiastic or over forceful. I even had to modify my beloved (and ludicrously expensive) Mont Blanc Meisterstuck nib because the ink-flow was less than it should have been. Fortunately in this case it was successful as it involved nothing more (once I discovered what the problem was) than sliding a razor blade between the nib tynes to part them very slightly, allowing the ink to flow more consistently. (The risk was that opening them too much would result in the ink running too freely and "blobbing" onto the paper.)

There are various tutorials on the internet (quite a few in fact if you search) .

how to modify fountain pen nib - Google Search
 
There seems to be a trend for flexible / calligraphy nibs, and I might like to try something of the sort as an all-purpose tool for drawing and writing.
 
I’ve got a few modern entry level fountain pens that people have given me (they see all the film cameras and typewriters and assume fountain pens are next - they seem to have been right). This thread makes me interested in a vintage fountain pen though. Where would you buy one in the US if you were going to? I’m just thinking a Parker perhaps. Is the Pen Market trustworthy? Thanks!
 
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