Home Brewed Fp Iron Gall Ink: Real World Test

[pharmacist]

This might be interesting for those, who have read my post about my experiments with reviving the old vintage ink formulas to make fountain pen friendly iron gall inks, based on the german Urkundentinte specifications.

 

After having used this ink for more than a year or so in my cheap fountain pens with ordinary stainless steel based nibs, without the slightest clogging and even after not using the pen for more than a week, I did not experience any clogging or other ill effects on the nib or capillary system of the pens. I like it even more than normal fountain pen, as the writing is completely waterproof and fade resistant.

 

So yesterday I did a test on plain writing paper with both Mont Blanc Midnight ink (IG) and my own home-brewed IG ink and also did some testing with an ink killer to bleach out the dye component of both inks and see the results below.

 

picture 1: immediately after writing, line 2 and 4 treated with a ink killer pen to bleach out the dye component of both inks

picture 2: same after 10-15 minutes

picture 3: same after 12 hours

 

As you can see the MB ink contains much less IG component compared to my home-brewed Urkundentinte and writing is considerably lighter after having bleached out the dye component of the ink.

[SamCapote]

That's the coolest discovery and demonstration I have seen here in a good while. Pretty amazing accomplishment really.

[pharmacist]

HI Sam,

 

did you see that the bleached out Midnight Blue line even becomes a bit lighter and the bleached out home-brewed gained a darker tone, despite the bleaching action of the ink killer after 12 hours ?

[bluemagister]

So where can we buy stable, 100ml bottles of this ink? Because I am ready for a LARGE purchase of IG ink to last for the next year or so.

 

[pharmacist]

HI Bluemagister,

 

Just drop a me a PM and I will tell you how get one or more.

 

best regards,

[fiberdrunk]

Congrats on your results! I should try something similar with my own iron gall inks, only I never added any blue dye to mine.

[in the flow]

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh! Very exciting! Totally nerdy

[WendyNC]

Where's the applause emoticon when I need it? That is totally cool.

[pkoko]

Really nice and cool.... How big of an amount did you "brew"?

[pharmacist]

HI pkoko,

 

well I made 2x 500 ml's of the ink and I still love this ink very much. The most difficult part is to get the right dye stuff: the aniline blue W.S. is very, very expensive. You do not need much of it relatively, but still. It behaves much better than I have ever would have thought. It flows very well and despite it is a IG ink, it writes remarkedly wet. However in some FP's, like Mont Blanc, it tends to flow very badly, but commercial IG ink like Lamy doesn't behave well either in this particular pen, so I think it is the pen itself behaving so badly. In most cheaper FP's it should be an excellent writing ink.

 

For those interested I sell this writing fluid for € 10/100 ml, which is not expensive, as I only charge the cost for bottle and the chemicals to make it. The pharmaceutical quality aniline blue W.S. dye is the one determining almost half of the price. Only the shipping can be costly, when it should be sent to within the EU or the USA (up to 2 bottles: €8 for normal postage, € 12.70 for registered (safer), 3-8 bottles: € 12 for normal postage, € 16.70 for registered).

[rhall_8]

Well done!

[reprieve]

I am impressed! I love the color of your iron gall ink. Congrats on a successful experiment!

[Gobblecup]

I am planning on buying some of your Homebrew as soon as I find the right bottle for it.

[pkoko]

Have you tried selling this ink on the FPN market place?

[Silent Speaker]

Hmmm intriguing...

 

Any projections on how long it's safe to let your ink sit idle?

 

100ml is a lot of ink to have to use in a 'short' while for example.

[pharmacist]

Hi all,

 

The ink is very well preserved and can be kept for years wIthout spoiling. It is very limpid and writes rather wet in most fp's.

[koa]

OK, but I want a GREEN iron gall ink. Already have Scabiosa, would be nice to have a British Racing Green that got darker. Since the dye color is optional, this should be possible?

[pharmacist]

It should be possible, but the type of green is critical: not all dyes are compatible with iron gall ink. for example: anilin blue is excellent, whereas methylene blue causes a rapid formation of sediment and renders the ink completely useless after a few days. I could do so, but it is a lot of experimenting. NEVER mix iron gall inks with other inks !!!

[fraafreg]

Are you experimenting to produce IG inks with more colours? I'm sure many of us are interested in colours other than the blue-black and purple currently available in the market.

[pharmacist]

Which colours are popular? In the end the writing becomes black. I think grey purple red and green will be popular colours.