Why bottled inks?
It’s all about refill-ability, permenance, dryness, wetness and of course, color.
Why bottled ink? Storing your ink in a coffee cup wastes perfectly good ink to spillage when carrying it in your backpack! LOL.
During pre-ballpoint times, FP cartridges were a big advancement, but, it was bottled ink that’s ruled for a long time. Cartridges are still widely available since they are great for travel, can be refilled, not as potentially messy etc. . In the US, the colour choices were pretty basic: blue, black or red each with many shades and variants. I recall being able to buy off-the-shelf in stores such as Katz & Betzhoff a.n.a. K&B, TG&Y, Woolco, Schwegmann’s etc there were Sheaffer inks (Skrip) and Parker (Quink) and Carters. (This section needs research). Fast forward to 2019. Man-o-manischewitz! There are more inks around, hundreds, than probably ever. We live in a terrific time indeed.
FPers do not mind inky fingers. It is almost a badge of honour. It tells the world you are not afraid to futz around with your FPs. And get them in tip top working order.
Ink has a very interesting chemistry that I know just enough about to be dangerous. I’ll offer some observations from my own ink experiences for now and leave it up to you to explore ink chemistry online. (A November 2019 Google search “fountain pen ink chemistry” raised more than 3 million hits!)
For some generalities, I recommend checking out the following webpage: https://fountainpendesign.wordpress.com/ink-function-chemistry-quality/ .
Or for those wanting a bit more chemistry: https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/ink-chemistry/3002158.article
Some good choices of Inks to have on your shelf are:
[1] Waterman Serenity Blue (formerly Florida Blue). Also known as the “Boy Scout” of inks, it’s a good general ink to start off new pens or satisfy pens that are acting up.
[2] Parker Quink Blue. Washable, good for making pen adjustments.
[3] Parker Quink Black or Blue-Black
[4] Noodler’s Ink Black, Blue, Red. Bullet proof, good colour depth. See Noodler’s Ink Chart at https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0843/4719/files/Noodler_s_Ink_-_Properties_Chart.pdf?14874038863214952929
[5] Private Reserve Tanzanite. The “laxative” of inks; high flow rate, probably higher concentration of surfactant.
[6] Sailor Jentle inks are good all-rounders with deep basic colours.
[7] Sheaffer Skrip inks; blue and black.
[8] Waterman Mysterious blue-black and green.
I travel with a 3cc syringe, 12G flat bottom hypodermic needle (polish off the point with sand paper), and little bottles of ink to refill my pens. For ultralight travel I do carry cartridges. A good pen pouch is the MaxPedition Mini which are easily purchased on Amazon.
Paper characteristics + nib + ink are the 3 main variables In FP function. A few thoughts on paper are below.
I generally use stitched bound school black/white ‘marbled’ notebooks that cost $1-3 (USD). These are lower quality paper with some bleed through. I have made an interesting observation on Mead and Norcomm notebooks (have not tested other brands yet for this observation). Every other page has a different texture alternating from tighter to looser fibers and hence little bleed to more bleed. I am not sure why this is the case. At first I thought it might be that in manufacture pages were alternated in orientation. That is not the case since the tight/loose effect appears on both sides of the sheet. So, what I usually do is to write on only the front side of the sheet of the looser grain and on both sides of the tighter grain sheets.
The other notebooks and papers I use and can recommend are Claire Fontaine staple bound and hard bound notebooks, Rhodia staple bound notebooks, Cambridge notebooks, Red-n-Black notebooks, Rhodia pads for letter writing (dot, lined, plain) and both recycled and de-novo printer papers and inexpensive 3-hole loose leaf (wide and college ruled). A low-cost hardbound notebook I can recommend is the Exceed label sold at Wal Mart. There is a limit to what qualities of paper can be used with FPs. Using ballpoints and many roller balls, with paste inks, allows one to write on virtually any quality of paper; newsprint quality of papers are not ideal for FPs due to bleed through and feathering.
Forward and onward!
It’s all about refill-ability, permenance, dryness, wetness and of course, color.
Why bottled ink? Storing your ink in a coffee cup wastes perfectly good ink to spillage when carrying it in your backpack! LOL.
During pre-ballpoint times, FP cartridges were a big advancement, but, it was bottled ink that’s ruled for a long time. Cartridges are still widely available since they are great for travel, can be refilled, not as potentially messy etc. . In the US, the colour choices were pretty basic: blue, black or red each with many shades and variants. I recall being able to buy off-the-shelf in stores such as Katz & Betzhoff a.n.a. K&B, TG&Y, Woolco, Schwegmann’s etc there were Sheaffer inks (Skrip) and Parker (Quink) and Carters. (This section needs research). Fast forward to 2019. Man-o-manischewitz! There are more inks around, hundreds, than probably ever. We live in a terrific time indeed.
FPers do not mind inky fingers. It is almost a badge of honour. It tells the world you are not afraid to futz around with your FPs. And get them in tip top working order.
Ink has a very interesting chemistry that I know just enough about to be dangerous. I’ll offer some observations from my own ink experiences for now and leave it up to you to explore ink chemistry online. (A November 2019 Google search “fountain pen ink chemistry” raised more than 3 million hits!)
For some generalities, I recommend checking out the following webpage: https://fountainpendesign.wordpress.com/ink-function-chemistry-quality/ .
Or for those wanting a bit more chemistry: https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/ink-chemistry/3002158.article
Some good choices of Inks to have on your shelf are:
[1] Waterman Serenity Blue (formerly Florida Blue). Also known as the “Boy Scout” of inks, it’s a good general ink to start off new pens or satisfy pens that are acting up.
[2] Parker Quink Blue. Washable, good for making pen adjustments.
[3] Parker Quink Black or Blue-Black
[4] Noodler’s Ink Black, Blue, Red. Bullet proof, good colour depth. See Noodler’s Ink Chart at https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0843/4719/files/Noodler_s_Ink_-_Properties_Chart.pdf?14874038863214952929
[5] Private Reserve Tanzanite. The “laxative” of inks; high flow rate, probably higher concentration of surfactant.
[6] Sailor Jentle inks are good all-rounders with deep basic colours.
[7] Sheaffer Skrip inks; blue and black.
[8] Waterman Mysterious blue-black and green.
I travel with a 3cc syringe, 12G flat bottom hypodermic needle (polish off the point with sand paper), and little bottles of ink to refill my pens. For ultralight travel I do carry cartridges. A good pen pouch is the MaxPedition Mini which are easily purchased on Amazon.
Paper characteristics + nib + ink are the 3 main variables In FP function. A few thoughts on paper are below.
I generally use stitched bound school black/white ‘marbled’ notebooks that cost $1-3 (USD). These are lower quality paper with some bleed through. I have made an interesting observation on Mead and Norcomm notebooks (have not tested other brands yet for this observation). Every other page has a different texture alternating from tighter to looser fibers and hence little bleed to more bleed. I am not sure why this is the case. At first I thought it might be that in manufacture pages were alternated in orientation. That is not the case since the tight/loose effect appears on both sides of the sheet. So, what I usually do is to write on only the front side of the sheet of the looser grain and on both sides of the tighter grain sheets.
The other notebooks and papers I use and can recommend are Claire Fontaine staple bound and hard bound notebooks, Rhodia staple bound notebooks, Cambridge notebooks, Red-n-Black notebooks, Rhodia pads for letter writing (dot, lined, plain) and both recycled and de-novo printer papers and inexpensive 3-hole loose leaf (wide and college ruled). A low-cost hardbound notebook I can recommend is the Exceed label sold at Wal Mart. There is a limit to what qualities of paper can be used with FPs. Using ballpoints and many roller balls, with paste inks, allows one to write on virtually any quality of paper; newsprint quality of papers are not ideal for FPs due to bleed through and feathering.
Forward and onward!