So I rather inadvertently sparked a fountain pen fueled Drop Dates/Release Thread hijack by casually saying I use fountain pens, so I thought I'd move the pen fest here.

I started using fountain pens almost exclusively a few years ago while I was still a student at Berkeley. A close friend used to work at this great mom/pop shop called Alko Office Supply, and while visiting him one day, I noticed some interesting looking pens in a display case. The pens on display were from a German company called Lamy - they're known for their more modern design palate - neat. I fired up my superconsumer "cool products" spreadsheet on my phone and created a new cell for Lamy. I had never given a thought to using fountain pens before because to my uninformed mind, they always seemed a bit impractical or "precious" (particularly of the intricately-engraved, gold-nibbed variety, or the cachet Mont Blancs). After reading up a bit on fountain pens, I learned that they were more practical than they seemed, so I picked up a yellow Lamy Safari, a converter, and a bottle of ink. I ended up loving how little pressure you needed to apply to write, and the fact that you could just use the same pen for decades and just refill it with ink as needed - very economical. Plus, I could now write in an almost infinite variety of colors - brown FTW! How often do you find brown-ink pens in your corner shop?

Anyways, I stuck with the Safari for a while, then when I graduated, I bought myself a Lamy 2000 set as a graduation gift. Geez, it was night and day. The Lamy 2000 was a lot more smooth, and held an incredible amount of ink. Sort of like moving from a solid performing plastic yoyo, to a blissful OD - the former was just fine, but once you move up, you never go back.

Recently, I've come to learn how great of a company Lamy is. All Lamy pens come with a Lifetime Warranty - no questions asked. My Lamy 2000 had for some reason literally split in two - spontaneously. I had gotten the pen from a vendor based in Malaysia, and was worried that Lamy would pull the "Authorized Reseller" business. It turns out that that's not how they roll, and all I had to do was send out the broken bits to Lamy. Rather than taking the easy way out and just sending a new one, they replaced the broken parts, popped my nicely broken in nib back in, and had the pen back to me in a week. Fabulous.

What about you? How did you start using this seeming anachronism, and what pens do you love? I'd also love recommendations for other "modern" looking piston pens, vintage or otherwise - particularly any Bauhaus designs. The only other contemporary pens that I like aesthetically are the Faber Castells, but they're not pistons .









PS: Other weird things I like - mechanical typewriters, and mechanical watches.

I would add this under either the Skills forum (as for some people, fountain pen writing is an unobtainable skill), or tack a note in the Other Hobbies thread in the Whatever forum!

db

Done!

Moved this from another thread:

I'm a fountain pen user as well, and have been since I was a teenager. My everyday carry is a Lamy 2000, which is what I have with me in Europe right now. But my baby is a new old stock military green, oversized Sheaffer Balance I scored about 10 years ago - the one in the back.



The picture is terrible, but it's all I have in my photobucket at the moment. The pen in the front is another OS Balance, one I ground to an italic nib.

Here's a pic of some of my collection:

I carry and use a Snorkel every day!
Dont let anyone know but "somewhere" theres a Catherine 888.
I saving that for a down payment.

How long do these take to dry, as a lefty I can foresee the problems I might have, but I'd really like to try this I think. I like the way that yellow safari looks!

Funny you should ask, because I'm actually a lefty as well! Personally, with the inks I've tried, and using fine or extra fine tipped fountain pens, I haven't had any issues with ink not drying fast enough, or smearing my writing. However, YMMV. I'm a left-handed "over writer" - when I write, my hand is positioned above the line I'm writing. Depending on your handwriting style, you might have more of a tendency to smear. Also, it'll depend on the paper you're using - if it's particularly slick/non-absorbant, the ink will dry slower, but based on my experience, I don't think this would affect most people.

The one thing that I have been annoyed with that has to do with being a lefty is having a bit more trouble finding a pen/nib that writes perfectly smooth, especially since I like using extra fines. Imagine holding a knife, setting the point down with a bit of pressure on a wooden table, and either pushing or pulling towards you. When you push it away from you, the point will "dig" into the table, and you'll have more resistance vs. pulling towards you.

Translated to handwriting, as lefties, we "push" when we write, and righties "pull". Since fountain pen nibs (the tips) aren't exactly as sharp as a knife point, you usually don't notice much of a difference compared to righties. However, since not all nibs are perfect, there's a chance you might get one that won't write too well.

Anyways, I'd say go ahead and try out the Lamy Safari - it's a really great, practical pen. It's made from ABS, so it's built like a tank - you won't have to worry about abusing it. I would suggest going with a Fine nib since it's more likely to be smooth out of the box (vs. scratchy), and less likely to smear since finer line = less ink on paper. Make sure you pick up a converter as well if you plan on filling from a bottle, and if you can, grab some Noodler's ink - their ink is really great, they have a great color selection, and they're based in the US. I would say they're like the OD of ink.

Lastly, if the pen doesn't write perfectly when you first get it, try giving it a week, or washing it out with warm water and a tiny bit of soap (especially the nib). With any new fountain pen, there tends to be a bit of oil left over from the manufacturing process, which can affect how the pen writes.

Damnit! Now I've spent the last 2 hours looking at fountain pens. Curse you internet!!!

My collection is eclectic at best. I have:
1. Sailor 1911M (Fine)
2. Pilot Custom 74 (Fine, but the nib is a little dry)
3. Lamy Safari (Fine)
4. Lamy Safari (Medium)
5. Sheaffer Balance (Fine)
6. Sheaffer Snorkel (Fine)
7. Unknown Sheaffer cartridge pen
8. Parker 51 (Fine)
9. Parker Striped Duofold (Needs restoration. Looks great, but the inside is toast)
10. Unknown Chinese P51-style pen

I'll get some photos up but I need to send the Duofold and Custom 74 out for some much needed work. Both are stunning but I wish the writing was a touch better, or in the case of the Duofold, I wish it wrote at all. I typically use Private Reserve Tanzanite ink as it is a great color and very lubricating. On the Safaris I use the cartridges because they are work pens and my customers don't care for purple receipts. I also have a Visconti red ink that I really like, but I don't use it much because it's red. I have a Noodler's Bullet Proof that I never use because I didn't care for the consistency after trying other brands. Finally, I have a Diamine super neon green that I mixed with Lamy black ink to darken with some success.

I'll try to get some photos up soon!

Oh man, I HAVE to see this. Green (anything from lime to neon) is my color.

I've always been interested in getting a fountain pen, but never got around to it. But after reading the above posts, I might get one. Now, I need to gather more information on fountain pens. Onwards! To the interwebz!

The one, and only fountain pen I've ever had (and still have mind you) is a Wahl Eversharp Skyline. Sadly, the original nib that it came with (which was the most amazing nib I've used) broke recently from an accident. I'm working on getting a replacement.
(also anyone who is selling pens, I might be in the market for one :3)

Do you recommend the regular Lamy Safari, or the Left handed Version I've found on amazon, there seems to be a debate as to whether the lefty version is necessary.

EDIT: I found out my mom had some old fountain pens lying around from when she used to dabble with calligraphy, so I got to try out writing with one. I really enjoyed writing with it, but found I made a huge mess. I know for sure I don't need a left handed one though. I think that part of the problem was that the ink wasn't very high quality, and did not dry very fast, and also I was writing nonsense all over the paper, rather then a simple note, or taking notes, so my hand was everywhere.

I'm still trying to decide if I'd actually use it enough to merit spending around 50 bucks for a pen and all the stuff or if I should just leave well enough alone and put the money towards yoyoing or one of my other hobbies like pipe smoking, I have my eye on a beautiful bent bulldog Savinelli. Regardless of my decision, thank you to opening my eyes to fountain pens as it is something I'll be on the look out for in the future.

Safaris are indestructible. Great pens and very reliable writers. It's the only one in my collection that I use daily. I have a lot of good writers and pens that look beautiful, but they sit in my ink well at home. I'm thinking now that maybe I should pick up a Lamy 2000 and use that exclusively. Now, I do smoke pipes too so I can understand the attraction, but once you find a nice nib as smooth as glass, you will cringe to use a ball point or gel pen ever again. That's the truth.

Keep in mind that if you used a calligraphy pen, it is likely that you used oil-based calligraphy ink as opposed to water-based fountain pen ink. Oil-based ink would likely give you a slightly different consistency. Fountain ink will soak into the paper quicker and generally dry faster. The thickest paper is best. Usually Moleskines, for example, will not be thick enough to write nicely without a lot of bleed-through. A nice thick vellum, say 80 gram paper, is perfect for fountain pens. I use Rhodia pads with very good results.

Give it a try, you'll be glad that you did.

I decided to get myself a Lamy safari after hearing such great things about em. I walked into my local pen shop, and they tried selling me one for 45 bucks. I walked out and went straight to amazon.

Let us know how you like it! I may be going to have a look see at a Lamy 2000 soon.

I agree with what stillinkansascity said. Calligraphy pens aren't really made to be very practical for everyday writing, the ink flow/nibs are different, and of course the ink is different as well. However, contrary to stillinkansascity's experience, I've had good luck with Moleskin-thickness/quality paper, but I guess this will depend on how particular you are about bleedthrough. With the Moleskins I've used, you can see the writing a bit from the backside of the page, and if I linger too long, sometimes I can get a true dot of bleedthrough, but nothing deal breaking IMO.

Another thing that stillinkansascity said is very true - once you start using fountain pens, you'll never want to write with ballpoint or rollerball pens again. They are truly very practical tools, and I would say that if you started using one, there's about a 2% chance that you would find it impractical to use on a daily basis. The only "downsides" I can think of are:

-having to refill from a bottle, since some may find this messy/annoying (for me, this is one of the big draws)
-not being able to write on some glossy/coated papers (e.g. Rite in the Rain waterproof journals) - for this, it's easy enough to have a ballpoint/pencil around for these odd moments

To your point about the opportunity cost of purchasing a fountain pen setup vs. yoyos/smoking pipes, I would counter this by saying that the marginal utility you gain from purchasing a fountain pen will probably greatly outweigh the marginal utility you gain from purchasing another pipe or yoyo. For most things, you get a significant quality of life boost from the first of that "thing" purchased (first high quality metal yoyo, first nice pipe), but as you amass more of these things, the returns will taper off a bit.

Since you don't have a fountain pen yet, you still stand to gain quite a bit.

Lastly, if you're still interested in seeing what fountain pens are all about, I'd be willing to trade my yellow Lamy Safari fine point (pictured above) + converter + bottle of ink + a few cartridges for a yoyo if you have things in your collection you wouldn't mind seeing go - I can add however much cash too. I'm still quite new to yoyoing, and would be really excited to try out something new. If you don't have anything you'd want to trade, I'd also be receptive to a temporary trade (exchange pen/yoyo for some "trial" period), a conditional trade (if you don't like the pen, we can reverse the exchange), or hell, if you don't have any yoyos to lend out, if you pay for shipping, I'd gladly loan you the Safari.

Since I'm also left-handed and have confirmed the Lamy is smooth/non-smeary, this might save you from a botched first experience as well. PM me if you're interested.

@stillinkansascity



You should definitely grab a Lamy 2000! It's my first/only higher end fountain pen, so I don't have much reference, but compared to the already solidly performing Safaris, the difference is night and day! The Safaris are reliably smooth, but the 2000 is buttery smooth. Plus, I really love the Bauhaus design. The barrel+section is seamless and streamlined and the way the "Makrolon" (polycarbonate) barrel is brushed makes it look a bit like wood. Over time, it develops a nice patina. Oh, and it's also a tank - the polycarbonate should be much stronger/more durable than the ABS the already indestructible Safaris are made of.

Speaking of "everyday writers", I've always wondered why a lot of people choose to predominantly use "lesser" pens when they own a lot of other "nicer" pens. I imagine you have many pens that write smoother than the Safari, or offer a "better" writing experience, so why only use the Safari daily? Is it that the other pens you have are vintage or more delicate/finicky? Or perhaps they're just very rare/expensive and you don't want to risk marring them?

I've only extensively used the Safari and the 2000, but now that I have a 2000, I can't imagine switching to the Safari for my daily writing tool (by choice). To me, it's sort of like owning a very reliable/comfortable VW Passat and also a Porsche Panamera - why not enjoy the Panamera daily?

Well that is a good point on writing with the best pens, as opposed to the cheaper. However, I'm acutely aware of the fact that I use my pen at Best Buy, where I sometimes hand it to a customer to use (usually writing with the nib upside down. I cringe) and I'd rather keep it simple with one Safari to do everything as opposed to my Sailor for me and a pocketful of ball points for others.

I get mixed up if I'm focused on something else and accidentally handing my Sailor off to be mistreated would be unacceptable. I've already had the nib and flow adjusted by Michael Masuyama of "Mike It Work" (a genius everyone should know) and it's too perfect for anyone who doesn't understand fountain pens to use.

Gosh that was a mouthful, but that's how I roll. Now when I go back to school in a couple weeks, I'll be using my favorites and leaving the Safaris at home.

Just got a Lamy Safari from Berzerk and it's awesome! I definitely need to get better at using it, but I'm a complete newb. I'll report back after I've used it for more than a few minutes.