I still think that fountain pens are the pinnacle of writing stationery. One lasts generations and there's no consumables that need recycling or disposing of, if you use a rechargeable cartridge and buy ink bottles.
I still think that fountain pens are the pinnacle of writing stationery. One lasts generations and there's no consumables that need recycling or disposing of, if you use a rechargeable cartridge and buy ink bottles.
They're also horrible to use if you're left-handed and writing English or any other left-to-right language.
There was this article posted here on HN about the geodemography of left handedness in the US, and all sorts of discussion about past culture of eschewing LH'ded children in schools and such...
and I was surprised that no one brought up the very real downsides of being left handed in a left-to-right writing system region of the world (which is most of it). Most comments were leaning towards backwards conservatism and straight up malice with regard to students being forced a hand in writing early in school and it seemed no one brought up the very real practical reasons for preferring to write right handed, especially with ink.
And I say this as someone who is completely ambidextrous when writing but does not do the 'hook hand' left hand to write, and thus I usually write right-handed with pens and pencils. I have a left handed friend who does write that way and it just screams RSI/Carpal Tunnel to me.
> Most comments were leaning towards backwards conservatism and straight up malice
That's because this is why it was done. My parochial school in the 1990s did not allow me to use my left had because of the associations with evil, and one need not look further than the latin word for left to realize how entrenched this mindset was. To extrapolate that into a beneficial practice for writing styles seems like an unfounded stretch.
Making left handed people write right handed doesn't make them right handed.
As a T-ball coach, I had every player bat left-handed in the first inning and right-handed in the second inning. They alternated each inning. I was surprised how much this upset parents.
"My child is right handed!" some insisted. I wondered how they could know that about a child who had never swung a bat before. I also wondered why a parent would want their child to be so limited.
This is hysterical: you are a T-ball coach for tykes, which are just picking up their first good coordination, and you let them feel their way, and someone tells you otherwise. Wow. You are good, while you need 6 foot tall signs for helicopter parents that say "Do not drink engine cooling fluid!"
You are a saint..
I wonder if those issues similarly affect the right handers among the 2 billon or so users of right-to-left writing systems?
Is there a significant difference in left-handedness in RTL countries? It seems strange to me that an RTL writing system would develop in a vast majority right handed environment, for the same reasons that left handed people have issues with LTR systems
No, RTL cultures still have the 10ish percent lefties. The difference is, RTL cultures developed writing styles and hand positions to work with RTL. Whereas LTR cultures treat lefties as an afterthought, so lefties only hear about actual good hand positions and writing styles as adults, after decades of learning what is basically a mirror to right-handed style.
As a counter example, I'm left handed and write hundreds of pages per year in a left-to-right language and don't have issues with smudging lines with my palm.
Maybe the inks I use dry fast enough (Parker Quink or Pelikan 4001) or it's the way I learned to write back in school.
You're probably doing the lefty-handed-curl. If you adopt a really weird writing position you can write without smudges. Depending on your body-type it's either easy and obvious or very uncomfortable. I'm in the latter group so I just use a pencil.
Euch. That lefty-handed-curl is a solution proposed by the right handed world. The correct way to write as a left handed person is to turn the page ninety degrees.
My left-handed father always turned the page 90 deg to the right when given something to sign, with the left side of the line up. He caught hell for that in catholic school.
> The correct way to write as a left handed person is to turn the page ninety degrees.
That is such a genius solution!
Or play it like DaVinci and write mirrored, right-to-left.
I looked up some pictures of this lefty-handed curl and I suddenly feel immense gratitude towards the people from my childhood that taught me how to use my left hand to write in a practical and comfortable manner.
I’d argue hand technique is more important than inks. I have wet pens with slower drying inks, and I write a similar amount without any smudges.
I'm right handed and used to smudge ink, don't ask me how. Only now, with my notebooks at 90 degree angle can I write properly without smudging.
You can always write in reverse like Leonardo DaVinci did.
Or if you occasionally spill coffee or any other liquid ever. I sometimes hand-write recipes. Fountain pens + sloppy kitchen meal prep are a bad combo.
You can get fountain pen inks that chemically react with cellulose for complete water resistance (there may still be a little smudging from unreacted ink washing off the paper). Noodler's Black is a famous example. I like this kind of ink, although it's not without its drawbacks, because cotton/rayon/other plant fiber clothing is also mostly cellulose and will be stained just as permanently.
I've used only Noodler's Bulletproof Black for years (in a TWSBI Eco piston-fill) - it works great, and I realized if I was going to take the time to write extensive notes it was worth having some protection against water.
I previously used Waterman Black - it flows really smoothly, but it isn't waterproof. Also, it doesn't seem quite as dark as the Noodler's.
> inks that chemically react with cellulose
I had no idea. Great tip; thanks.
I'm looking for alternatives to lamination for posting outdoor flyers & signs.
I just received some (alleged) weatherproof copier paper to experiment with.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MQ3UNWL
You can get some very permanent water-proof inks. Platinum Carbon black is my favourite.
Platinum Carbon Black is a wonderful ink. It seems to work very well in cheap fountain pens with flow issues. It’s highly resistant to coffee spills and looks ok on mediocre paper. Only drawback is cleaning it up; it cleans up like used motor oil.
De Atramentis, too, has a range of permanent inks which are quite fast-drying, too.
Happy customer for years.
Perhaps a silly question, but would something like a Mahl stick help with left-handed writing? Painters and old-school draftsmen use them to keep their grubby mitts off the surface.
I suppose in today's public school you wouldn't be allowed one because it could conceivably be used as a weapon, but it would seem to be helpful.
Left handed person here. Writing is already a chore, tying up both hands just to use a fountain pen without smearing seems to cross an effort/reward boundary.
Maybe useful if you were really committed to the tool. I've been casually interested in fountain pens for a while but the downsides seem to stack up whenever I actually look into it.
You don't have to hold the stick, generally. For painting, yes, but you wouldn't have to when writing. It would just hold your hand up a little bit.
Maybe try a dowel with a glob of clay or something on the end and see?
The biggest crime to lefties is the fold-away half-size writing desk you see in lecture halls.
>Mahl stick
Thank you for using its name. I first saw it on TV showing someone hand painting a design on a car (probably a Rolls Royce on Top Gear) and thought it was brilliant in its simplicity, but didnt know its name.
I just made one with a dowel and a big superball, but I've seen one that they put a skateboard wheel (with bearings) on the end so it rolls.
The Wikipedia entry is "Maulstick": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maulstick
You need a fast dry ink and good paper. But yes with usual supplies, it can be problematic. My kid enjoys writing with fountain pain but her furnitures are given by school and they hand out a lot of printedpaper to fill..So no luck.
The problem I find is fountain pens are awesome in the dragging motion but really don't do well with a pushing motion. Writing left handed in a LTR world means you're constantly pushing the nib while a right hander drags the nib.
Ah yes. I'm right handed and I've suffered from this when trying RTL scripts (Arabic) for calligraphy. It's a challenge to keep your hand from blotting what you've written.
As a lefty, I disagree, but I don’t “overwrite”. I hold pen like a righty.
Fountain pens are great but that's only half the equation. You need to consider paper as well.
Because I'm usually using low quality paper, I mostly use ballpoint pens so that I can write on both sides of the page. Fountain pens can feel scratchy on cheap paper and the ink bleeds through.
My first full time software engineering paycheque went towards a Lamy 2000. I've been using it for many years now and it's never let me down.
That probably costs more than I ever spent on all writing utensils I've ever owned.
What makes this cost that much (other than they are owned by uniball)? The material certainly isn't worth that much? And the function would be replicated in the market for less? So, what makes it not some luxury bullshit?
Ever buy yourself something nice that you use often? A nice belt, a nice comb, or a nice razor? A nice kitchen knife arguably does the same job as a cheap Walmart special.
Sometimes it's nice to splurge on high quality items - especially when you use them every day, like a pen. It's a little thing, but it brings pleasure every time you use it.
Not everything is about cost efficiency. You'll never regret buying quality.
I think the budget play is to get a cheap refillable fountain pen and some cheap fountain pen ink (I bought some Diamine bottled ink about 10 years ago and I've still got plenty left).
More expensive fountain pens are indeed luxury products - replicas are often available on places like aliexpress.
I think it probably feels like bullshit if you don't think you'll gain any satisfaction or derive any pleasure from the act of writing or the aesthetics of your writing instrument.
I'd been using the much cheaper Lamy Al Star (admittedly also a step up from the plastic Lamy Safari) for a while, and I really liked the feel of them. To be honest, I kind of just wanted a nicer version of that, and the 2000 did not disappoint.
The nib feels much, smoother. Mine is fairly wet without excessively showing through low quality paper. The refilling mechanism is a lot nicer than the cartridge-pump I'd been using on the Al Star.
Is it better? Yeah, but it's not 10x better than the Al Star which is what the price would suggest. So it is definitely a luxury product from that point of view.
I agree :)
My daily driver is a Pilot Vanishing Point. It's a fountain pen with a form factor of a clickable ball point pen.
Vanishing Points are nice pens. I have an all matte black one. Also, pens tipping gets polished according to your handwriting over time, making it completely yours.
I also like Lamys. Most of their pens look simple but they’re work horses. Esp. Safari Umber.
I’m a bit too deep in that rabbit hole. :)
I wish I could find a faceted VP --- still kicking myself for not buying one when I had a chance a couple of years ago.
Totally agree. I used a fountain pen all the way through school and university.
My all time favourite was the Parker 25 in stainless steel, with a medium nib and blue-black ink. Sometimes I would go for purple if I was feeling a bit raunchy.
I know a lot of people liked the 105, and I had one, and a bunch of others, but there is something about the utilitarian functionality of the 25 that I really have a soft spot for.
I think there was a year or two where I may have flirted with ballpens, but not seriously.
Also even used Rotring and Staedtler Mars technical drawing pens on and off for regular writing. That was always fun in the middle of a lecture with ink everywhere.
It's such a shame I don't get to write on paper that much these days. No real need. Such a beautiful experience though.
> there's no consumables that need recycling or disposing of, if you use a rechargeable cartridge and buy ink bottles.
Genuine question: don't you need to dispose or recycle the ink bottles?
They’re usually glass and last years. So maybe Gp isn’t counting that as consumable
> One lasts generations
Multiple Parker Vectors I had typically lasted a few years of use each before the plastic windings between the pen head and the holder wore out or broke.
My Pilot Metropolitan did the same just a few months back.
I still have the high-end pens my grandfather used that, while mechanically still sound, I am unable to get the ink flowing through them.
I love writing with fountain pens, but long lasting they are not in my experience.
I disagree. I used a Waterman Expert for a long time. It conked out when someone I loaned it to dropped it. I switched to a Noodlers Ahab (which has a flexible nib) so you can do a little bit of flourishing for headings etc. I've used it for a long time and still do. Recently, I switched to a broad tipped Lamy Safari (which was a birthday gift).
My main problem is that most papers can't really handle the inkflow from fountain pens anymore and since the place I come from is somewhat humid, the papers quickly start to bleed ink. So, my more common instrument is a Pentel graphgear mechanical pencil.
I do calligraphy as a hobby so I have separate arsenal of dip pens and nibs but those are not for daily use.
I’ve also got a noodler ahab that’s been going strong for years- vegetable resin body, plastic everything else except the metal nib, clip and ring around the opening of the cap.
I have multiple pens which are a decade old, incl. a Metropolitan and Safari, and write like day one despite being used frequently.
I also have a couple ones older than 50. They also work. Clogged ones generally need a good flush with a fountain pen flush.
Also, if you do not want to spend on any specialized fountain pen flush solution, diluted windex works very well. From the smell I am willing to bet that most fountain pen cleaning solutions are exactly that.
Thanks! Unfortunately we don't have Windex here. Many of them here contain alcohol, and some others contain lemon juice to remove calc stains from glass. I wouldn't risk that, actually.
I use J. Herbin's flush, which doesn't mind being used over and over. I filled an old Lamy 30ml ink bottle with one, and flush my pens with the same "liquid". From what I feel, it has some soap, some other surfactants, which it doesn't react with the rubber and seals inside the converters and pistons. Alcohol eats them from my experience.
The bottle I have gained interesting properties. It's a green-turquoise hue, which becomes reddish if you shine strong light through it :)
But it cleans like it's never used, which is nice.
Have you tried ultrasonic cleaning with plain water? I got a cheap ultrasonic jewelry cleaner and started cleaning my pens with it, and they work beautifully.
I have an ultrasonic cleaner too, but no pens were stubborn enough to necessitate a bath inside it.
I generally "power flush" my pens with a syringe: Get a 50ml syringe, cut the sealed end of a cartridge, fill the syringe, mate the syringe, cartridge, pen, and push the water through. After a couple of times, the pen is thoroughly cleaned. Shake a couple of times, let it dry.
On the other hand, many (if not most) inks have some detergents in it, and keep your pen clean and clog free as long as you use them. Older inks used Solv-X which was more effective but deemed carcinogen and banned in modern inks.
I have a Metropolitan and the only reason I don't use it is because the cap doesn't seal well and the ink evaporates quickly.
Yes, metropolitan is not a “super sealer” which you can leave for a period, then pick up and write. It demands to be used regularly. It also doesn’t like to stand nib-up for long periods.
Because of it, I generally EDC it with a good, low maintenance inks, and try to use it very regularly. As an EDC pen, the nib balances its quirks.
Lamy 2000 and Pilot Custom 823 are two of the most patient pens I have ever used in that regard.
The stainless steel Parker Vector is much harder-wearing and available for under £15. Same nib unit as the plastic ones.
(I found them particularly good when used with the washable ink cartridges, never drying out even after long periods of disuse. The permanent ink isn't as good in this respect and the pens need more regular use.)
Parker Vectors were cheap Parkers in my experience. They were like the 40 dollar nikes that you used to get. More money was spent in the brand than the quality.
I got a Parker Sonnet as a prize in a competition. It is still good, even though I rarely use it nowadays.
I've had an ancient Parker 51 for a good decade or so now which I use almost daily, that originally belonged to my great-grandmother.
I'd expect there to be a reasonable amount of variation in how long these pens last due to differences in usage, machining tolerances, ink types and materials - though mine has done very well considering how many times I've chucked it into a bag, dropped it on hard floors, etc. (I've probably just been lucky so far).
Parker, Waterman, Rotring were all bought by Newell (Rubbermaid) and gutted. You have to go back to 20th-century production to get the real thing.
My go to choice for several decades since high school, even got to collect some throught the years, mostly Parker.
However they are also dangerous, beware of hand movents when holding one, otherwise there is quite some cleaning to do, and even document rewriting.
Fountain pen requires some skill to write well. It's amazing in the hands of those who knows calligraphy and just creates extra smudges for those who are more used to normal pens.
It takes no time at all to figure out if your only real goal is "I wanna be able to use this as deftly as a regular pen". Really no more difficult than knowing how not to smudge marker by closing a book while it's still wet, for instance.
Well, there are the bottles ink comes in --- I left behind a drawerful of empty Sheaffer bottles at a previous job which I've always regretted.
Agreed, except I have _not_ been able to get my Aurora Hastil to write/fill reliably for a couple of years now, despite cleaning, and I can't send it in to the manufacturer since the tip was ground to a chisel italic by Gretta Lostkemper (who used to oversee custom grinding at Sheaffer). Guess I need to get an ultrasonic cleaner and try that....
Oh hell no. I used fountain pens, good ones, for nearly 20 years. They leak, blob all over the place, are difficult to refill, require cleaning, end up with servicing problems when you really need to write immediately. Also difficult to draw complex diagrams with. Absolute self inflicted pain and misery.
I use Muji gel pens now. None of those problems and you can take the cartridges back to them and they recycle them. And the pen bodies themselves last functionally forever.
I vaguely remember the writing tip getting blunt after a while and needing change.
That happens on inexpensive nibs which lack iridium (or some similar metal/alloy) tipping.
A tipped fountain pen will be incredibly resistant to wear --- while I did significantly wear down the inexpensive Platignum (British brand, but despite the name untipped steel) fountain pen I had when I was younger after a couple of decades, when I finally switched to using more expensive pens with nibs for tipping, haven't had to replace a nib since.
Yes definitely agree, I own the Rotring 600 and 800 pencil and they are fantastic, as already said the ballpoint version is dependant on the refill. The construction is sturdy and they feel very robust and heavy. But... I've recently transitioned to Pilot Capless fountain pen and it's night and day with the write feeling: https://www.pilotpen.eu/our-products/capless/ with ink bottle refill. The nib size is important, I found the medium too large and landed on the fine nib size.