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25 Jul 2005
When I was bemoaning the state of my handwriting a while ago and asking for advice on how to go about improving it, several people suggested that a good pen---particularly a fountain pen---helps a lot. While my handwriting has improved a lot as a result of all the good advice I got, I felt that a good fountain pen would probably make it even better---or at least more comfortable.
I've had a Lamy Safari fountain pen for a number of years, but I've found it to be a bit unreliable as far as ink flow goes. It also has a rather broad nib, and forms a rather wet, blobby line on the paper in my Moleskine. So I decided to splash out on a decent pen. After a lot of shopping around, and writing "The quick brown fox..." in a slightly embarrassed fashion on numerous pen shop testing pads, I settled on the Rotring Newton. In fact, this is the very pen that Lyle recommended in the comments of my post.
I love the sturdiness of this pen. It's very solid metal, and looks as if you could run over it in a tank without ill effects (to the pen). I like to think that if I'm ever in a super-villain's secret underground lair with some huge stone door about to crush me, I could probably save myself by wedging the door open with the Rotring. Happily, it also writes very well. It is---as Lyle pointed out---nicely weighty in the hand, and I find that this helps the stability and regularity of my writing a lot. The nib is very smooth, and the perfect 'three bears' happy medium between a smooth but wet broad nib and a dry but scratchy narrow one.
I don't like cartridges (they always seem like a waste of money and hassle to get hold of) so I bought a convertor to use bottled ink. It took a couple of goes to fill the pen from dry, but the flow is now very even and reliable. To complete my conversion to fountain pen fanaticism, I've even ordered a couple of bottles of Noodler's Ink on the recommendation of several people on the 43folders list.
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An article that helped me a lot in improving my writing skills
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I have a wood finish fountain pen made by a bloke at a market in Seatle. I don't use it often enough but you've inspired me! For a low cost version incidently there is the disposable Pilot Vpen.
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Oh fabulous. I don't know this pen, must keep an eye out.
There's a great shop in Brighton called Pen to Paper. You might want to look at their ink selection. Herbin inks come in a vast array of colours both in cartridges and in bottles, and how can you pass up an ink whose name is "cacao du brésil"?
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The link didn't make it:
http://www.paperpenalia.com/handwriting.html
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odd, i've found my metal lamy to be the only pen to write nearly as well as my waterman.
anyhoo, just popped in to pass this unrelated item on, as it may be of interest: http://sciencecommons.org/
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Pilot Vpens are OK - they've been around a few years now. But they're still horrendously tacky and plasticky (if that's a word) - given the choice I'll stick with the chunky rotring, cheers!
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I'm not sure it improves my handwriting, but I do love my Mont Blanc, I have had it for a long time and enjoy the very manly broad nib. I have not tried other inks as my pen mechanic say to stay with the Mont Blanc ink. I enjoy your blog, keep up the good work. Thanks, Jim http://www.photoday.blogspot.com http://www.scolman.com/CameraWork/index.html
by Jim Scolman @ 26/07/2005 3:08 pm • Permalink •
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Very cool. I recent bought myself a pen for Father's Day after years of hinting at wanting one. I got a Waterman Liason Cobra on sale at Levenger. I got the medium nib, but ther ecertainly are times that I wish I had gotten the fine nib. I like the size and texture of the pen.
I need to practice with it more. 
by Jeffrey J. Hoover @ 26/07/2005 5:08 pm • Permalink •
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Gene: Yes, I'm looking forward to getting the inks. Mr. Bsag was interested in getting a few colours for fountain pen sketching, and the waterproof nature of the black is useful when you want to put a watercolour wash on top.
Lyle: Purple, eh? I'm more of a blue-black girl myself, but I've also ordered a red-brown and dark green for a bit of daring variety. I did get the silver one, I'm glad to say.
Ian: I tried a disposable fountain pen a few years ago (I can't remember if it was a Pilot) and it was really bad. I suppose it might be a nice idea, but I think that one of the best things about fountain pens is that they aren't disposable.
arnaud: Nice article. I'll have to practice my 'air writing'.
Pica: Sounds great! I assume that cacao du brésil is brown?
Saltation: Maybe I was just unlucky and got a lemon, but apart from the rather wet line (which would probably be better with a narrower nib), but my Lamy always stalls and stutters---it's like a bad ballpoint in that respect. It was one of the plastic ones. I don't know if the nib units are different in the metal and plastic ones. I know that many people speak highly of the Lamy, so it's quite likely that I was just unlucky.
I've been following the Science Commons project closely, and think it's a fantastic idea. I could have sworn that I'd linked to it before, but it seems that I haven't.
Jim Scolman: OK, now I'm in awe of you---you have a pen mechanic? I've always wanted to know if Mont Blanc pens really write better than a 50 quid fountain pen, but I just know that if I ask to try one in a shop, the assistant will give me that "Yeah, right..." look.
Jeffrey J. Hoover: Sounds wonderful. Pens are such a personal thing.
To all: By some huge cosmic coincidence, there's a play on Radio 4 this Thursday at 2:15pm called 'Ink' about the 19th Century inventor of modern writing inks, Henry Stephens.
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Air writing is not easy but I found doing the exercises does improve my writing 
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I must admit, I've had three of the Lamy Safari's now - the plastic ones had a nasty habit of breaking at the screw-thread, but that's because I've got big hands, and probably tightened it too much.
However, I've found the nibs to be consistently good - the Teflon coating on them certainly had some properties for making the writing smoother (for me) and they were always easy to use, and I've never really had any problems with ink flow etc. It's possible you just had a duff one.
Actually, thinking about it, the only time I had real ink-supply issues with the Lamy's was when I'd stored them nib-up for a few days. At that point the ink dried out in the nib, and they were a bastard 'til I washed the nib out in warm water (one thing a reservoir refill is great for, as opposed to using cartridges!) and then all was well again.
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I've had a Mont Blanc foutain pen for nearly ten years now, and it still writes as well as when I got it. I have since gotten a couple more pens and a propelling pencil and they all write nicely and are balanced "just so". I know they are hideously expensive (and I am consequently scared of losing them!) but I think they have been superb for me.
When you buy the pens, they seem to come with a thick nib (although I believe this is only medium according to MB) so I have had the nibs in my desk fountain and portable fountain for fine (or maybe it was extra fine). They did this for free when I got them, sending them back to MB and then returning them to the store after a couple of weeks.
The MB ink seems pretty good and writes nicely in my Moleskine books.
by Stressed Academic @ 27/07/2005 9:08 am • Permalink •
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[...] Fountain pens So I decided to splash out on a decent pen. After a lot of shopping around, and writing “The quick brown fox…†in a slightly embarrassed fashion on numerous pen shop testing pads, I settled on the Rotring Newton. [but she’s a girl… ] [...]
by Splodgebucket » Blog Archive » Fountain pens @ 29/07/2005 11:08 pm • Permalink •
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The Lamy is a great pen. Also check out the Namiki Vanishing Point fountain pen. The only retractable fountain pen.
Chris http://amateureconblog.blogspot.com/
by Christopher Meisenzahl @ 01/08/2005 4:08 am • Permalink •
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Another Noodler's fan here, preferably the waterproof colors.
Chris http://amateureconblog.blogspot.com/
by Chris Meisenzahl @ 08/09/2005 1:10 pm • Permalink •
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After a few months now how do you find the Rotring?
(Small world - I was searching for pens on the Net and, in particular, the Namiki Vanishing pen. Your site came up top of the Google search! Do you ever find that places on the net that you know in one context crop in other, apparently wholly unrelated contexts? Bizarre).
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Jolyon: I love it. It's always a pleasure to use it, which is pretty much what you want from a writing instrument. It also survived a long journey to Brazil without leaking or any other incident. The Noodler's ink is also working out really well.
Yes, I do often find the same thing when using Google, most annoyingly when my own writing comes up. I yell at Google that if the answer to my question was in my own writing, I wouldn't need to use its service, but of course Google doesn't know that 
.
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Check out the mini fountain pen at JetPens
by chad @ 20/10/2005 2:10 am • Permalink •
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This sounds wierd but it does work really well and is not messy. The problem of using your pens filling device is that you need to stuff the knib into the ink bottle which is a messy business.
I have found the best way to fill your fountain pen is to remove the ink filler thing from inside and get a hypodermic syringe and needle fill this with ink from the bottle and squirt it into the fountain pen filler thing until it is full, pop the filler back into the pen and voila the pen is full of ink and you don't need to spend five minutes cleaning the pen up.
I have written with fountain pens for, my God is it that long, over 25 years. I have a cross pen and my favourite a Mont Blanc MEISTERSTÜCK SOLITAIRE DOUÉ STERLING SILVER CLASSIQUE which was a generous gift.
If and when you have some cash lying around invest in a Mont Blanc.
by Mike @ 02/11/2005 10:11 am • Permalink •
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chad: Ooo, they are really cute. Do you know how they write?
Mike: Great idea! Do you get any problems with air locks in the nibs doing it this way?
I think the whole 'cash lying around' thing is an 'if' for me rather than a 'when'
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Nope no problems with airlocks in the pens that I use.
If you do get an airlock just turn the screw on the filler thing a little to push some ink into the knib.
I'm happy today that I have my Mont Blanc back after it went to be repaired. It was leaking ink from around the top of the knib. I think it has been on too many long haul flights. Anyway its now repaired. Disappointingly they replaced the whole knib, rather than just the plastic bit under the knib, which is a pain as I now have to wear the knib into my style of writing again.
by Mike @ 03/11/2005 11:11 am • Permalink •
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hi there i want a mont blanc fountain pen. i practise calligraphy and love lettering. i want a pen that writes so smoothly and with not too fine a nib. any suggestions of anyone thanks tessie
by tessie @ 06/12/2005 1:12 pm • Permalink •
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Try some of the second hand sites, I've used School Pens and Andy's, great service.
http://www.andys-pens.co.uk
http://www.oldschoolpens.com
I think the older pens are smoother and more consistent than modern ones, not had good experiences from Mont Blanc. My 1950's Schaeffer is much better, but a little fragile to be carried around every day.
by Julian @ 16/12/2005 4:12 pm • Permalink •
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Brilliant choice.
I only have two better fountain-pens and they also happen to be the Lamy Safari and the Rotring Newton.
I dont know why but the Safari just doesn't give a good handwriting output, maybe its not heavy enough for good control - or maybe I'm a klutz. 
Anyway the Newton has taken over for writing purposes and the Safari just looks pretty on my desk.
I guess the only complaint I could have about the Newton is you can't really put the cap on the end.
-- Vince.
by Vincent Wong @ 15/01/2006 2:02 am • Permalink •
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You will love Noodler' ink. It works quite well on a Moleskine. You might find the finer the nib the better the ink placement on the paper. Bigger nibs hence wider lines work through the paper. Lamy's are great pen for the price. I just picked up a Sailor which has an ultra fine point. A converter full of ink last for pages. Fountain pens really are a personal preference. You have to try a few as well as inks and colours to get what you want. Waterman also makes a nice ink but colours are limited. There brown is not even close to Noodler's Inks "Beaver". Don't forget Noodler's black is waterproof. Once you have it on paper it doesn't wash away.----- Glad to have helped! grin
As for ink, I tend to use a very antisocial purple in my Lamy Safari (the aluminium one, which also seems to be tough as old boots) and a green in the Rotring.
I do hope you got one of the plain silver Rotrings - I got the "graphite" finish, which looks ace at first, but after six months bashing about in a rucksake starts to scratch off and look shit.
by Lyle @ 26/07/2005 7:07 am • Permalink •