----- --- 21916048 Does /lit/ use fountain pens? --- 21916082 >>21916048 (OP) throughout my undergrad I used a pen my father bought me, but due to the price of cartridges being so expensive, I couldn't --- 21916365 >>21916048 (OP) Yes. They make my handwriting look less bad. I have been thinking about buying a nicer one (specifically one of the new Esterbrooks), but the $200 price tag seems a bit baffling so I keep putting off buying one. I’m tired of using cheaper pens that feel like they’re scraping the paper rather than flowing on it. >>21916082 You can reload cartridges with a syringe, buying bottled ink, or use a converter cartridge and do the same thing. --- 21916500 >>21916365 Yeah who uses cartridges lmao. A bottle of ink and a converter/cartridge+syringe is extremely cheap. Probably cheaper than using ballpoint pens if you don't lose your fountain pen.yvtrr8 --- 21916675 >>21916500 I still use cartridges just for the convenience and I don’t care about spending a bit extra. (Also, a lot of international standard size disposable cartridges aren’t really that pricey.) I like that they’re no mess, but I will probably be expanding out to reloading or using a converter so I can try more ink types. If money is your hang up then you should load your own for sure. --- 21916679 >>21916094 That penmanship is pretty disappointing. --- 21916691 yes they stop your hand/fingers hurting if you're writing fro a prolonged length of time and are nice objects to collect, fixate upon, restore, buy, sell --- 21916717 >>21916048 (OP) unlucky. here in germany you can buy pots of 100 for a fiver. --- 21916831 >>21916679 --- 21916936 >>21916094 --- 21916944 >>21916365 $200 is hopefully just an 18k nib which does make a slight but noticeable difference in smoothness. And is a vacuum fill, or get a nice pilot custom, please. Anything over 30 bucks that has or does things better than a 30 buck pen is worth it. That excludes a lot of expensive pens made from fucking plastic that don't even have a gold nib. --- 21917026 >>21916936 Pps, I don't remember writing any of this but want more of whatever the fuck I was on. --- 21917029 >>21916936 --- 21917048 I have oily skin and water ink struggles to work whenever I'm writing something at the place where my hand was positioned previously, so I use gel pens instead. >>21916094 Try better paper, bro. --- 21917067 >>21917048 It's a reasonably smooth pentalic journal for drawing, I'm catching because left handed and shit at writing because left handed. I write better in reverse. Also I should probably break out the ruler for calligraphy and not be kinda drunk when I do. --- 21917073 >>21917048 I wasn't going to waste any of my good paper on a reply to someone on a Mongolian ice fishing forum --- 21917125 >>21917029 Not a my diary desu thread and I don't want it to be but I wonder what happened to the first one. It's either still around with some pages torn out or I burnt the whole thing. That was some pure schizo shit from a ten year old. --- 21917147 >>21916831 >>21916936 Hey gramps, it's past your bedtime --- 21917368 I have a couple high quality pens but the Lamy Safari is my go-to pen. Just $35 with a converter. What I love about it is the plastic is the same used by Lego --- 21917416 >>21916048 (OP) >doesn't use quill and ink --- 21917428 A Pilot Metropolitan and Noodler ink is all you need. Both cheap workhorses that will last you a lifetime of writing. Anything more expensive and fancy is both feminine and dumb. --- 21917907 Yes, but I think I fucked it by washing it in very warm water. The flow is poor and it seems to suck up more air than put down ink. Hopefully it's because I'm just using bad paper, but who can know? --- 21917978 I hate writing by hand but I have used them for inking drawings back when I tried to git gud at illustration. --- 21918008 yes i use a cheap Platinum and Zebra on a daily basis, might opt for a more expensive/fancier one if i ever want to treat myself --- 21918067 A fountain pen is more than a mere writing utensil but a true instrument. --- 21918112 >>21917368 My Safari is the main fountain pen I use, but it’s not the smoothest writer in the world and starts and stops on putting ink down sometimes. The smoothness and stop/start issue with cheaper pens in the main reason I’ve been considering buying an expensive fountain pen instead. Also it seems like premium fountain pens do a better job of sealing the top when it’s on, so the pen doesn’t dry out with prolonged non-use. --- 21918117 >>21917428 Is it scratchy? Does it always start immediately when you touch it to the paper? --- 21918186 >>21918112 You should try a wetter ink. Noodler's Legal Blue is very well behaved on cheap paper and extremely wet. --- 21918190 >>21916048 (OP) >fountain pens I don't know that brand of keyboard manufacturers. --- 21918204 My twisby precision has stopped working smoothly. Kind of sucks because I really like the piston fill mechanism. --- 21918236 >>21917428 holy fuck does Pilot sell EF Metropolitan? Your picrel is exactly what I'm looking for, link? --- 21918269 >>21918204 Can you replace the nib? --- 21918299 Most homosexual thread on /lit/ award --- 21918307 >>21916094 >Don't buy a fountain pen unless you can actually write cursive you absolute ape --- 21918632 >>21918307 Your writing is still going to look better using a fine or medium nib on a fountain pen than using a 0.5 ballpoint if you have bad handwriting. Bad handwriting combined with a chicken scratch ballpoint looks like true shit. --- 21918916 >>21917067 possible psychopath >>21917029 scared, fearful, neurotic >>21916936 scatterbrained >>21916831 insecure >>21917428 self taught, normie adjacent --- 21918948 I use a cheap zebra fountain pen. I love it because it is comfortable to use, minimal pressure needed and looks much neater than the ugly traces of the equally comfortable rolling ball. I don’t carry about a pen being fancy or expensive though as i don’t write to larp --- 21918963 >>21917428 I started with a similar stack but found the Metropolitan to have a poor cap seal, and so my pen usually needed to be run in water or dipped to get it flowing when I wanted to use it if it sat more than a day. Faber Castell Essentio and Lamy Studio LX are probably all I need. Both are also prone to drying out after 5+ days during the winter. I might get a Platinum pen just to have something that I don't have to mess around with when I want to use it after a week. --- 21918982 >>21916048 (OP) yes, i suck fat cock. --- 21918987 >>21918117 >>21918204 These issues, and many others, with fountain pens are the results of some stupid niggers starting making them with round ball nibs (like if they were fucking ballpoint pens). Any such crap can be trivially repaired by regrinding it into a proper, stub (italic) nib, though a "professional" service doing it will cost you a kidney and a mortgage. Learn to grind your own, it's a few minutes "work" and you will forget about any "hard starts", drying, skipping, blotches, whatever. A good website of how to do it here: http://www.marcuslink.com/pens/aboutpens/ludwig-tan.html Btw, these stupid (greedy) niggers will charge you extra for a pen with an italic nib, which is way easier to make kek (you pay extra because your pen now actually works) --- 21919094 >>21918948 I have one, but if I recall correctly they use a proprietary cartridge that’s a bit pricey and annoying to get. I’ll eventually just refill the cartridge I still have in it, but I’ve had this for years and not used it much because of all that. (I’ve not used converters or bottled ink in years, but I assume you can only refill a cartridge so many times before it starts to leak as well?) --- 21919099 >>21918987 Thanks for the heads up. I knew nib grinding was a thing, but I never understood exactly why. --- 21919118 >>21919094 Cartridges are like a buck fifty, it really depends on how much writing you do for that to be expensive. It can be if you write almost exclusively by hand rather than typing --- 21919286 >>21916365 You should check out /r/pen_swap to find a solid deal. I was able to snag a Sailor Pro Gear for ~$100. --- 21919292 Is cursive supposed to be superior --- 21919366 Only downside is that it's such a chore to get them working again if you leave them lying around for a while and they dry up. --- 21920665 i love writing --- 21920676 >>21919366 Gotta run warm water through them, but yeah. My understanding is that if you find a higher quality one where the cap seals air off properly, you can leave them unused for extended periods and not have them dry out. --- 21921064 What do you write using them? Is it more for journaling or short stories or what? I get you can use them for anything, I'm more curious what people actually prefer them for --- 21921180 >>21918982 phwoar, write me a letter anon --- 21921204 >>21921064 I use them for writing notes for my work meetings, for letters I write to (usually older) members of my family, and for while I’m working on my writing projects, since I typically keep a pad next to my computer to jot down things. In terms of practical usage (as in why you’d use a fountain pen rather than a ball point), I find it typically makes my writing look nicer and less like a third grader’s scrawled handwriting. --- 21921210 >>21921204 And also for my journal, I guess I should have mentioned, which I want my handwriting to look nice for. --- 21921281 >>21921064 I like to consolidate information. We learn better when we write what was heard, and so when I'm listening to a podcast or watching a Youtube video that deals with facts that I want to remember, I practice handwriting while embedding knowledge. The pages then make for nice quick-reference. Might as well do it with a pen that is actively pleasant to write with, with the ability to switch colors. --- 21922040 TWSBI makes a very affordable and durable piston fountain pen. I highly reccomend them. I own "nicer" pens but still just use the TWSBIs. I really like sailors black pigment ink.