A Great Pen Store and a Vintage Find...

I won't rehash a review of Joe Rodgers' Office Supply in Cleveland, Tennessee (outside of Chattanooga), but if you're ever in the area, it's every bit as good as Bob from My Pen Needs Ink makes it out to be.  (Link Here to his Review).  They have a large fountain pen section at the front of the store that features Conklin, Delta, Visconti, Waterman, Parker, Sheaffer, Lamy, and well, lots of other brands.  They also have a floor to ceiling ink cabinet that is packed full of ink, including THIS: 

J.B.'s "in the wild" Montblanc Bordeaux find.

Don't go inundating them with phone calls, now, because I got the last bottle.  However, they did have some late-1990's vintage bottles of Montblanc Black, Emerald Green, and Ruby Red.  I picked up a bottle of Ruby Red as well but have not tried it out yet.  The best part?  This:

Apparently the owners became Montblanc dealers in the late 1990s, but are in the process of liquidating their stock because the pens did not sell well.  They had a few smaller pens remaining, priced very well, but nothing screamed at me and I was saving my money for D.C.

Apologies for the blurry pic, but yes, they honored that price.  $8.25 for a bottle of discontinued Montblanc Bordeaux, which I might add, is probably the best burgundy ink I have ever used.  I compared it to the new Burgundy color at the DC Pen Show Ink testing station and the new ink is much lighter. 

Unfortunately, I stopped by Joe Rodgers on a brief detour from a work trip, so I did not have time to seriously root around.  Who knows what else you might find? 

Ink Review: Sailor Souten

Thanks again to Ron and the folks at Pen Chalet for sending this bottle of Sailor Souten over for review.  Souten is the "replacement" for the now-discontinued Sailor Sky High, the light blue ink that everybody loved and now mourns.  Well, I'm here to tell you that for most people, Souten will be a perfectly satisfactory replacement, but those who loved Sky High for the "red sheen" it left as it dried might be disappointed.  Some of the sheen remains with Souten, but it's more subtle.  Personally, I'm agnostic on this issue.  

What you have with Souten is a very well-behaved, bright mid-range blue.  I've seen some reviewers describe this ink as too light for daily use, and even washed-out.  I did not find this to be the case in any way whatsoever.  It's similar to Iroshizuku Kon-Peki, but cheaper (even with the new pricing from Sailor) and doesn't feather and bleed as much.  You can see from the writing sample below that I really layered the ink down on Rhodia (which is high quality, but will feather and bleed in extreme cases), and did not see a bit of bleed-through.   

A comparison with Miruai and Yama-Dori, great colors all around.

A comparison with Miruai and Yama-Dori, great colors all around.

This scan is a pretty faithful reproduction of the colors shown above, but as with most scans, the colors probably "pop" more in real life.  The photos below capture that.

Pen Chalet carries the full line of Sailor Ink and Pens. In the interest of full disclosure, I received this ink free of charge for review purposes. 

Ink Review: Rohrer & Klingner Scabiosa

The blog's been a bit heavy on ink reviews this week, but I'm still churning my way through the load of inks I trucked home from the D.C. Pen Show two weeks ago, and I'm writing reviews as I use them up (which I need to do, seeing that I have over a dozen pens inked right now).  Hopefully I will get some pen reviews photographed and finalized this weekend.  But in the meantime, here's today's review:

Rohrer & Klingner inks come in a 50ml glass bottle, which is tall and works well for filling pens that have a larger nib.

I held off buying this ink because I had a bottle of Pharmacist's Purpura Imperialis, which was a nice enough color but ended up being a bit too dry for me.  (My review of that ink, from a long, long time ago, can be found here.)  The Scabiosa is similar in that it initially writes in a purple tone but dries to a purple-black.  I find, however, that the Scabiosa has slightly better flow and behaves more like Montblanc Midnight Blue (iron gall version).  This is probably because those inks have less iron-gall content than the Pharmacist inks. 

This ink also has been reviewed a lot, and is very popular, so I won't bore everyone with another lengthy discussion of its properties, but it does work well on cheap paper (most iron gall inks do) and dries fairly quickly.  The ink also offers some nice shading, which I've attempted to capture in the photo gallery below, along with the color shift as the ink dries.  You may notice that the "fresh" writing at the bottom of the handwritten sample is notably lighter than the writing at the top.   

I should emphasize that you need to clean your pen out every two weeks or so while using this ink, especially if you use steel nibs and/or pens with metal parts that come into contact with the ink.  Iron Gall can react with and corrode steel and some steel alloys over time, and if you leave a pen inked up for months on end and don't practice good pen hygiene, bad things can happen.  Otherwise, it's perfectly safe to use and enjoy.  I've been using iron gall inks for years without any ill effects.  

Handwritten Review of Roher & Klingner Scabiosa with Edison Herald (Medium Nib) on Exacompta stock. 


Ink Review: Sailor Yama-Dori

I was fully expecting to find this ink overrated, and thought it would be impossible for it to live up to the hype generated before its (re)release.  I was wrong.  While I love Miruai and Nioi-Sumire, Yama-Dori is probably going to end up being my favorite of the new Sailor Jentle line.  

The color is a dark teal.  Miruai could also be considered a very dark teal, but this ink has a different tone altogether because there's more blue in it.  The color has a lot of subtle depth:  there is some reddish sheen to the ink once it dries and you look at it from an angle, but it doesn't photograph very well (at least with my limited skill and equipment).  You do, however, see a lot of shading with some black coming through where the ink is heavily applied to the paper.   

In a way, the ink reminds me of a mix Pendleton Brown does (or did, before Organics Studio started making inks for him) called Blakwa, which I understood to be a 50/50 mix of Waterman Black and Waterman "Inspired Blue" ("formerly South Seas Blue," commonly known as "turquoise").  That mix didn't have the sheen, and wasn't as saturated, but I always thought it was a cool color. 

Yama-Dori has all the properties of the Sailor Jentle ink line:  good dry time, even on super smooth paper; low feathering and bleed-through, even on super cheap paper, and what I would call a very balanced level of color saturation.  It's not watery ink, but it's also not super saturated to the point where it will smear.  What I especially like about this ink is that it's an interesting color that is dark enough to use for work, or pretty much any other purpose.   

Handwritten Ink review of Sailor Yama-Dori Ink on Exacompta card stock.  The pen I used is a Pilot Vanishing Point with a Broad nib stubbed by Mike Masuyama. 

 

Thanks to our sponsors at Pen Chalet for sending me this bottle. In full disclosure, I received this bottle for review purposes free of charge.   

Pen Review: Karas Kustoms Render K

I've been looking forward to photographing and reviewing this pen for a while, because it's probably my favorite non-fountain pen that I own, and the pen that I end up using the most when, for whatever reason, a fountain pen is impractical.  It's also been a while since I've reviewed a non-fountain pen, so I'm overdue.

Karas Kustoms Render K (Hi-Tec-C Version) in red anodized aluminum. 

The Render K is produced by Karas Kustoms, a shop located in Arizona that produces machined goods, including multiple pens that accept the Pilot-Hi-Tec-C, G2, and Juice refills, along with others that will work once they are cut down or slightly modified. 

All of Karas Kustoms' pens, including the Render K, were launched on Kickstarter.  Being late to the game, I did not get the opportunity to participate in any of the early Kickstarter campaigns, and ran out of money in the pen budget while the "Ink" fountain pen campaign was going on.  The pens are easy to pick up through Karas Kustoms' website (link here), although they do run out of the various anodized color options from time to time.  There are also raw aluminum, copper, and brass options.

The Build.  This pen is rock solid.  I've been unable to find a single flaw in the machining.  Again, I would call the Render K a "solid" pen, but it's not too heavy, and it still fits well in the hand.  Due to the weight and the way the threads are cut on the cap, the pen does not post well, but the size is adequate and I find posting the pen unnecessary.  The anodized aluminum coating is durable, but it will scratch and show some wear if it is carried loose in a bag or pocket with other metal objects (such as keys).

.4mm Pilot Hi-Tec-C Refill in--what else--red. 

The Refill.  I chose the version of the Render K that accepts Pilot's Hi-Tec-C refill, and opted for the .4mm.  I like a smoother refill, and I find that .4mm is the sweet spot for me:  fine enough to use for annotations, but not too scratchy to use as a daily writer.  You can also purchase a version of this pen that accepts the Pilot G2.  My other two Karas Kustoms pens, the Retrakt and the Bolt, both use the G2 refill, which I enjoy. 

The Pilot Hi-Tec-C has a good "classic red pen" color.  It's nothing eye-popping, like some of the red fountain pen inks you see out there, but it gets the job done.

Close-up shot of the color.

The Verdict.  I enjoy this pen.  It's sturdy and its always on my desk or in my bag.  I swap out the refills to alternate between red and black, depending on my needs, but give that I'm a sucker for red pens and red ink you can guess which one I use the most.  If you want a pen that's virtually indestructible and can accept one of the more popular "ultra fine" Japanese gel refills out there,**  the Render K is one of your best options.

** I will note that with some slight hacking (trimming down the refill with a pair of scissors), the Render K will also accept the Signo DX gel pen refill, although I have not used that pen extensively so I have not reviewed it here.