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M400 ink capacity


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Anyone measured the ink capacity of the M400? I reckon if you measure each drop after a full filling you get about 20. Any variations - just curious.

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Modern 200/400 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 24.5mm, potential ink volume:1.29 ml

Modern 600 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 26 mm, potential ink volume:. 1.37 ml

Modern 800 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 26 mm , potential ink volume: 1.37 ml

Modern1000: piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 28 mm , potential ink volume: 1.47 ml

Vintage 400 : piston bore 9.0 mm, piston stroke 31 mm , potential ink volume: 1.97 ml

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Modern 200/400 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 24.5mm, potential ink volume:1.29 ml

Modern 600 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 26 mm, potential ink volume:. 1.37 ml

Modern 800 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 26 mm , potential ink volume: 1.37 ml

Modern1000: piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 28 mm , potential ink volume: 1.47 ml

Vintage 400 : piston bore 9.0 mm, piston stroke 31 mm , potential ink volume: 1.97 ml

 

Re; the vintage 400, I take it that includes the 400NNs ? I have been impressed with my 400NN's capacity - I have filled it once with waterman blueblack since I got it and it is still 2/3 fill even though I've been writing a lot with it over the last few days.

Platinum 3776 - F, Pilot Decimo - F, TWSBI Vac Mini - 1.1i

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Yes Highbinder, identical large ink capacity for vintage 400 N & 400NN

Francis

 

 

 

Modern 200/400 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 24.5mm, potential ink volume:1.29 ml

Modern 600 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 26 mm, potential ink volume:. 1.37 ml

Modern 800 : piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 26 mm , potential ink volume: 1.37 ml

Modern1000: piston bore 8.2mm, piston stroke 28 mm , potential ink volume: 1.47 ml

Vintage 400 : piston bore 9.0 mm, piston stroke 31 mm , potential ink volume: 1.97 ml

 

Re; the vintage 400, I take it that includes the 400NNs ? I have been impressed with my 400NN's capacity - I have filled it once with waterman blueblack since I got it and it is still 2/3 fill even though I've been writing a lot with it over the last few days.

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I agree with Highbinder, my black 400NN holds more ink than my modern Pelikans. I have been using it quite a bit lately and it is still half full.

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  • 6 months later...

That capacities variations of the same pen, e.g. M400, 1,8mL according Mr.Mottishaw's nib.com and 1,29mL according fountainbel, probably is due to feeder capacity, if one add its volume or don't add. To Measure directy the feeder capacity can be very tough job, but we can measure indirecty - just weigh the pen with and without ink. Assuming that 1mL = 1g, we can accurately evaluate how much ink the pen holds (resevoir + nib feeder). It's necessary a precision calculator, but, nowadays, it's relatively cheap.

 

Fabricio

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Vintage 400, piston bore 9.0 mm, piston stroke 31 mm , ink volume: 1.97 ml :notworthy1:

 

And mine has an OF, so will write longer than expected....do a nice scribble and :clap1:

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

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  • 10 months later...

Glad this showed up on google so easily. I just measured in the lab that the ink usage of my Pelikan M205 Duo with Binder XXF 14K nib in a good pocket-size moleskine (.3mm line) at 527 micrograms per word or 69mg a page. So I should get about 2400 words out of a 1.29g fill with that nib, or a little more than 18 pages at 130w/pg. These pens really go through the ink. With a F nib (.6mm probably) I'd be lucky to get 9 of those tiny pages per fill. For comparison a UniBall Vision Micro (similar line width to XXF) is about 4 times more miserly at 16mg for a 138wd page. Generally guessing at 2g ink in one of those that'd be 125 pages, still well short of a full 192pg notebook. Not sure what a ballpoint would use, but I'm sure it would have no trouble with 192 pages. A Zebra 1mm ball uses less than a mg per page, and though the total ink weight in one is most likely a lot less than a gram, the ink level hasn't changed noticeably after 4 pages. It took me most of a semester of 2-3 letter-page size essays to finish off a Bic Click, which is the only time in my life I ever ran a ballpoint out of ink instead of having it get so old that it quit writing from age.

Edited by radellaf
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[...] I just measured in the lab that the ink usage of my Pelikan M205 Duo with Binder XXF 14K nib in a good pocket-size moleskine (.3mm line) at 527 micrograms per word or 69mg a page. So I should get about 2400 words out of a 1.29g fill with that nib[...]

 

:D

 

Calculating ink consumption, comparing ink reservoirs are activities quite enjoyable! My broad nibs have been spending a lot of ink!! I have been using almost 90ml of ink every 2 months :o

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Glad nobody minded my resurrecting th thread.

 

I did a m150 F test and got 35mg for the (small) page. That was odd compared to the XXF so I found I'd made a calculation error. The XXF used 29mg per page, so not even double the UniBall Vision Micro's consumption, and 45 pages worth if the M205 Duo holds 1.29g of ink. That's a little more reasonable, considering that letter size pages would use probably 4x as much ink. Those rollerballs sure would be expensive if you used them heavily at $2-3 per pen.

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Wow! I never thought that things like the number of words written with a particular nib size would be a great concern of so many. But one of the great features of my Pelikan Souveran M400 is the transparent ink view window which enables me to avoid the annoying problem of running out of ink in the middle of taking notes at church or writing a card or letter. (I use a converter in my Cross Townsand which also allows me to visually check the amount of ink on hand.) You never know when most roller ball pens, or good ball point pens, are about to run dry do you? As a matter of fact they do tend to last so long you forget that they will sooner or later run out of ink, and I don't know anybody who carries a spare refill with them on business trips like those who use and love their fountain pens, either carrying extra cartridges or vials of ink.

Ultimately, whether your pen can lay down 1000 or 10,000 words between refills doesn't change the amount of ink it uses does it? And if, from the impressions I get reading post about inks, people like to switch off on the color and/or brand of ink they use in their favorite pen, having an ink reservoir of 1.2 mg is probably more desirable than one with 1.2 grams.

Finally, writing with a fountain pen, for me at least, is not the number of words I can put out between fillings, it is about how much I enjoy putting those words on paper using my fountain pen. If you have to, or better yet just want to write something down, one might as well enjoy the physical aspects of writing as much as the intellectual ones of being able to express ones thoughts.

Well these are just the thoughts of one man, and I might be wrong :mellow:

Lou

 

 

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Given the same general tech, then yes, how many words a pen writes on a fill does depend on how much ink it uses. Capacities are within a pretty small range (.6-2mL).

Why would one care? For me, because the scale was there, and I was curious. Heck, they used to make a pen with markings on the ink window as to how many words you have left.

Most of the rollerballs I use have ink windows, and most ballpoints and gel pens have plastic refills that easily show remaining ink levels.

 

I rarely travel but have only once or twice brought any ink or even cartidges. I'll fill my pen, if concerned I'll carry a 2nd or 3rd maybe with another color. No tragedy if I run out of ink on any of them since I always have a few rb,gel,bp, or pencils along. Honestly though I don't have a chance to write much so a number of trips the only ink I used was a couple of credit card signatures. But, I enjoy having a nice pen with me even I I don't use it.

 

It's like flashlights, batteries, or any other essential items. If you _need_ it then "two is one and one is none."

 

FWIW the XXF I tested is in a M205 Duo, a completely transparent pen. Still, it's cool to know I can write 40+ pages on a fill, even if I top it off at halfway down.

 

Edit: Just got my new red & black M400 (great luck o the draw F nib, smooth and very F) and measured the ink capacity with a syringe. About 1.3cc bottle filled. I found out since I did the twist piston/pull ink off feed with syringe, repeat method to empty the purple noodler's so I could mix in a half cc or so of blue. Filling it back up the reverse way (fill feed with syringe, twist piston, repeat) I got maybe 1.4-1.5cc in there with absolutely _no_ bubble when you look thru the barrel. You do all this nib-up, and after you generally use a tissue to get the excess out of the feed, so I'm sure .1cc ended up in the tissue. Anyway, 2cc definitely doesn't fit in a M400 of current vintage.

Edited by radellaf
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