# Fountain pen impressions (long)



## Haynie (Jan 25, 2012)

I am very new to the fountain pen life style and thought I would write up my thoughts on using one as a daily writer for a month.

 I made my first fountain pen a little over a month ago.  I decided I wanted to see what all of the hubbub was about.  I decided that for me to really get the experience I would have to adopt it as my daily writer.  As a teacher I do a lot of writing on mainly cruddy budget paper.  I spent a lot of time talking to Ed, from Exotic Blanks about fountain pens and ink and nibs.  I also had a few questions answered by Brian at Meisternibs.  With the help of these very knowledgeable and helpful individuals I decided to upgrade my nib from the regular kit nib but not worry about going uber expensive.  In the end I grabbed a Jr. Gent II kit, heritance nib, and private reserve ink.  Once the kit was made and the nib changed thanks to the library at IAP I sat town to tune my nib to the way I write in the manner described to me by Ed.  As I watched TV I drew figure 8s on a brown paper bag with no ink in the pen.  It was a good program and I spent quite a bit longer writing figure 8s than was suggested.


*Changes I had to make*
It was clear right away that I would have to change the way I wrote.  I am accustomed to writing with ball point pens and roller ball pens.  I never really thought about the death grip I was writing with or the pressure I was putting on the paper when I was writing with a ball point pen.  It is possible to write with a roller ball in the same manner as a ball point pen but a fountain pen tells you right away.  A fountain pen requires a decidedly non-manly fluid writing style.  I suppose I should write in cursive but I have NEVER been able to do that.


*Positives*
My writing arm, shoulder, and hand have taken a serious beating over the years.  As the injuries catch up to me I have found that writing became painful after a short period of time.  After switching to the fountain pen I am able to write for longer periods if I do not post the cap.  The combination of softer grip and less pressure helps.


  It is smooth and consistent no matter what paper I write on.  Yes the fancy Claire Fontaine is sweet to write on, but the school budget does not allow for fancy paper.  Around here we have regular old Xerox paper, three ring binder paper, news print paper, and the rough stuff the student planners are printed on.  The nib I have has a ball point like tip and this may add to the smooth writing experience.  I assume flat tipped nibs would be scratchy and hang up on the fibers.  The gravity fed ink does not skip and leave blank spots like ball point pens do.  I have even had this issue with roller balls on recycled paper that has very smooth pieces mixed in.  You are writing along and a big chunk of a letter does not get written. This is not an issue with the fountain pen.  Being a fast writer I was worried about the ink not keeping up with me.  I have not had an issue.  In fact, if I write slow I find the lines become much more bold and this allows me to put subtle emphasis on words just by slowing my writing stride a little.  This is a nice bonus when writing a note to kids on the bottom of their papers.


  Let’s face it, these pens draw attention.  There is just something classy about using one.


*The negatives are few but they are big.* 

A fountain pen is not a rugged drop on the ground, run over with the car, kind of pen.  As I said my writing hand has taken a beating over the years.  I have some nerve damage and tend to drop things on occasion without realizing it.  If I am writing something standing up I have to consciously remember to cap the pen.  I know that if I happen to drop it on the nib, the nib is history.  



  You have to keep the thing nib up.  While this may not be an issue to many it is to me.  I do not wear shirts with pockets most of the time.  This means I have to figure out how to carry the pen so it stays up right.  I have found that carrying it in my pocket seemed to cause the ink to come out.  This must have been caused by the heat.  Because it needs to be carried nib up I am not able to throw it into the back pack, fly bag, or camera bag and hit the road.  Both of these items get tossed around quite a bit and do not always sit top up.  This means that I am not able to comfortably take the fountain pen on photo outings, into the boonies, or trips to the river.  I have done it and whenever the cap is removed and I use the pen my fingers turn blue.  The ink is jostled out and drops onto the grip.


  Until I can come up with a more rugged design I will have to stick with the Space Pan as my general purpose throw in the pocket and go pen.


*Conclusion*
All in all using the fountain pen on a daily basis has been a very pleasant writing experience and I do not plan on going back to the ball points except for the Fisher Bullet pen.  Using a roller ball even feels like a step down.  A more rugged pen is in the designs but there will not be a way to avoid the need to be upright.


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## SCR0LL3R (Jan 25, 2012)

Interesting feedback on your experience. Thanks for the writeup. I too have very little fountain pen experience but I will be taking a break from making pens for others to make a few for my own collection (I haven't made a single one for me yet). There will certainly be some fountain pens in this collection and I will be giving myself as much experience with them as I can.


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## paintspill (Jan 25, 2012)

i've switched to a fountain pen almost exclusively and i carry mine around in the front pocket of my jeans every day and have never had an issue with ink. might be worth experimenting with some different nibs and ink.

cheers


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## IPD_Mr (Jan 25, 2012)

Mark - First I commend you are spending the month solid to make an educated observation.  Very good write up.  The only thing that I saw missing was how you feel about filling the pen, were you at school at a time when it ran out of ink and what did you do?  Did you use cartridge or bottled ink.


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## Haynie (Jan 25, 2012)

Good point on the ink.  I don't mind filling the pen at all and it was a quick learn on how to do it.  At the advice of folks on this board I used bottled ink and a converter.  The cartridges look like they would not last long and the converter seems to hold a lot of ink.

I have not run out of ink at school yet.  It happens when I am either at the shop (the other job) or home.  When it happened at the shop I just stopped writing until I got home and refilled.  If it happened at school, I don't think I would find that any more inconvenient than running out of ink with a ball point.  It is a school.  I would switch to a pencil.  I might get a film canister and store some ink in my desk to avoid running out.


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## Ruby pen turning (Jan 25, 2012)

Very good review on your experiences. I write left handed and have tried a few times writing with the tip that comes with the kits. Being left handed, I have to push rather then drag across the paper. The tip seems to scratch (gritty) the paper as I write. Would switching nibs do away with the scratchiness? I think better paper would definitely help but I cannot tell others what paper to use:O)
Brian K.


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## Haynie (Jan 25, 2012)

When I started doing the inkless figure 8s on the paper sack the nib was REALLY scratchy.  by the time I was finished it was good and polished.  I wonder if this would solve the left handed issue.

I just let a student write their name with my pen and it was scratchy for them.  I could hear it clicking as they wrote.  They had a lite touch too.  I guess when someone wrote that these were truely personal pens they were right.  My pen is now accustomed to me anf the way I write.  Cool!


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## Ruby pen turning (Jan 25, 2012)

Ahhh I see. Rough bag = polished tip. Never would have thought of that. Gunna give it a try.


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## Jerryconn (Jan 25, 2012)

There is no doubt that using a fountain pen requires a change in your writing style. 
I wanted to take a minute the comment on a couple of the items that were brought up in the posts above. 
First, I do not carry my fountain pens nib up.  They are (I carry 3) carried in my Day Timer in the pen sleeves sewn in the binder. So they are carried in all sorts of orientations. Admittedly I do not bounce them around a lot.  That said, I can see where if carried nib down in your pocket against your body the ink would expand.  Maybe I am lucky, but mine have never leaked.
I do have a fountain pen I carry in my pants pocket (I do not use pockets on my shirts, personal thing)  It is a Kaweco Sport.  Below is a picture of the pen. it is a plastic pen that is pretty rugged. It bounces around all the time and it has leaked one time when I let the front section come loose which in turn allowed the cartridge to come loose from the section. 

The tuning of a FP does make it personal.
I am a lefty and tend to push the nib at times, but I have found that I can tune the nib to prevent the "dig ins". 
All of the nibs I use are the steel nibs that came with the original components (don't use the word kit).  To me a steel nib can take the pressure exerted by someone who converts to FPs from Ball points better than the other nibs.  In fact if someone has a heavy hand it is possible to damage the better nibs.
The grocery bag is a good way to get the nib polished for your hand.  The folks that tune nibs for a living use Micro-Meshas well as dremels, that may be because they need to remove material quickly to get the job done and get on the next job. I had read somwhere that the grocery bag is roughly equal to 12,000 grade MM but I do not know for sure.

I have used fountain pens for over 2 years now and hope I never have to go back to BPs or RBs. I do a fair amount of writing eveyday and the fatigue is almost non-existent.

My $.02 worth


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## azamiryou (Jan 27, 2012)

Thanks for sharing.

I made myself a fountain pen about a year ago, and have been using it as my daily writer since then. I figure that if I'm going to sell fountain pens, I ought to have some experience using them, right?

Carrying/storage. I generally carry mine in my shirt pocket or my jacket's inside breast pocket. If I have no shirt/jacket pockets, I'll carry it in my hand (for a quick trip to the store where I'm just going to be crossing stuff off my list), put it in a bag or briefcase (if I'm carrying one), or leave it home. At home, I never store it cap/nib up. I just set it on the table or desk, and there it lies.

Handwriting. Using a fountain pen actually motivated me to improve my penmanship. Cursive is better suited to fountain pens than printing is, plus having a classy "instrument" makes me want my writing to look classy, too. I went through the "Fix it... Write" program, which lets you essentially keep your own handwriting style while improving its fluidity, legibility, and appearance.

Posting: I started out posting the cap, but as soon as I started the handwriting program, I discovered that the pen was *much* more comfortable without the cap posted.

Today, I'm still happy to grab and use whatever pen is around when I need one - but I really enjoy using my fountain pen. I use it whenever it's handy, and for any special writing (letters), I'll definitely seek it out to write with it.


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## Mapster (Jan 27, 2012)

I have also been considering jumping into fountain pens, but have one question. Can you see the ink through good old school lined paper? I used a rollerball for a short period of time and had to give it up because you could see it right through the paper (back to ballpoint :frown


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## ragz (Jan 27, 2012)

Haynie,
Have you considered using a Pilot vanishing point? It's a fountain pen but is a click as well and when the nib is extended for writing is hooded as well. No cap to worry about and also xcan be bought in a black tactile finish


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## Jerryconn (Jan 27, 2012)

Mapster said:


> I have also been considering jumping into fountain pens, but have one question. Can you see the ink through good old school lined paper? I used a rollerball for a short period of time and had to give it up because you could see it right through the paper (back to ballpoint :frown



In all likelihood you will, to some degree the tuning of the nib and the color ink you use will minimize it. But that paper is very thin and the ink bleeds through.  If you can have the nib tuned to put down a thin line it should help.
I write all day long in a Day Timer and on Copier paper and mine is somewhat visible on those papers. But I have mine tuned for a bolder/wetter line.


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## ctubbs (Jan 27, 2012)

I have been using mine as my daily righter for over a year now.  I also carry a BP when I just must right through multiple copies (UGH).
I was unlucky enough to never have been taught how to write cursive due to moving from one state to another while in grade school.  Later when going to college, what little cursive I had picked up went out the window taking notes.  Once I made my Triton and tried out the wonderful way the ink just flows onto the paper, I made the effort to learn how to write better.  At 66, that was a hoot, to say the least.  No, my cursive is not a thing of beauty yet, but it is many times better than it was before my FP.  Thank you for taking the time and effort to make your report.  Very enlightening.
Charles


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## GoatRider (Jan 27, 2012)

azamiryou said:


> I went through the "Fix it... Write" program



That's a strange web site there. It looks like it just has a tarball with the contents of the site source in it.


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## azamiryou (Jan 27, 2012)

GoatRider said:


> azamiryou said:
> 
> 
> > I went through the "Fix it... Write" program
> ...



Hmm, I just tried it again and it works for me (Firefox 9.0.1 on Windows Vista).

Here's a different official page for it: Barchowsky Fluent Hand - Italic Handwriting - Fix It...Write

Here it is on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Fix-Write-Nan...4584/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1327716870&sr=8-1


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## GoatRider (Jan 27, 2012)

azamiryou said:


> GoatRider said:
> 
> 
> > azamiryou said:
> ...



Heh, now it works. I must have caught it mid-upgrade or something.


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## Haynie (Jan 27, 2012)

It has been suggested that I purchase x fountain pen.  You know something, now that I am making pens I just don't have the desire to buy one.  Maybe that is weird. Those pilots are pretty sexy though.


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## ragz (Jan 27, 2012)

It wasn't so much a suggestion that you should just a reccommendation from your observations. I never really thought I would buy one either since I can and have made my own. Since I bought it though I haven't used any other pen. I'm sure my infatuation will pass sooner or later. Which maybe sooner since I completed one of CaptG's watch blanks


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