Is This An Uncommon Color?

[kharrisma]

Hi Everyone,

 

So I thought I scored a root-beer on the 'bay the other day; the pen was really dark, and had a reddish cast. It definitely wasn't copper, and definitely wasn't a red pen either. The whole photo had a slight red tinge to it, but even so, I was pretty sure it was a root-beer. The auction had only about thirty minutes to run, but I shot a question to the seller anyway.

 

At just thirty seconds to go, and no answer from the seller, I went ahead and pulled the trigger on the sale. Several days later, this is what showed up (photographed with a "normal" gray Estie for comparison):

 

 

Sorry about the lousy photo; my camera suddenly seems to have developed autofocus issues. I can't say I've ever seen a super-dark gray color before; is this an uncommon color for Esterbrook, or have I just missed it somehow? I missed my root-beer, true, but I'm not totally disappointed (unless this is actually a common color!).

[gweimer1]

I just sold an Esterbrook with that dark gray color. I'll wait for the experts, but I was under the impression that some of the color variation wasn't intentional, but resulted from ongoing learning of the plastic molding processing during manufacture of the pens.

 

So, I'm speculating that while colors may have been blue, red, green, silver, copper and brown - the variations are far more diverse.

[injesticate]

This is my grey Estie. From your pic they look to be a similar color. Once nine shows up they may not. Having said that though, it is an Esterbrook, so you can't really go too far wrong :-)

[Veltri]

A bit of red in the grey could be from them making a batch of red pens, then switching to gray without a complete cleaning. There also seems to be a lot of blues with black in them.

[kharrisma]

There's no red in the pen; the red was in the photo; probably a phone pic, you know how they are! It's just a very dark gray with light gray streaks in it. I was surprised because I've only ever seen the one colored silver Estie. I'm happy to have the variant, though!

 

Edit: I think I'll try to find a broad nib for it, and fill it with that new J. Herbin " Stormy Gray" ink with the gold shading!

Edited October 16, 2014 by kharrisma

[Veltri]

Ah! I didn't read that they were both actually completely grey.

 

I've seen a few of the dark ones come up in the last weeks and picked one up myself for $10, but I do see them less frequently than the lighter shade of grey. I would say they are by no means rare, but it would look nice with that Stormy Grey!

[FarmBoy]

There is a lot of variation in the colors, except possibly black.

 

What you have is a gray pen on the dark end of the scale.

[MKeith]

Not rare. I have one with nice combination of dark stripes and "mackereling." My only Canadian made Estie also.

Edited October 17, 2014 by MKeith