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Pelikan Extra fine nibs


entropy_00

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I have read that Pelikan no longer gets their nibs from Bock and makes them in house.

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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Does anyone know where I can buy these new "1 Chick" Pelikan <EF> nibs by themselves [without the body]? I have a <EF> nib with "2 Chicks" on it that came with the Pelikan I bought from a nibmeister, and as smooth as it is, it writes like a <M>, and I want a true <EF> nib.

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QUOTE(scubie02 @ Sep 25 2007, 04:34 PM) 378617[/snapback]QUOTE(Phthalo @ Sep 23 2007, 09:28 AM) 377012[/snapback]I got one correct Pelikan EF out of seven I tried last year... of the pens I kept, I eventually had Richard grind the nibs to XXXF.

 

Two new Pelikan pens should arrive in my mailbox this week, both with factory EF nibs - it will be interesting to see if things are any different this time around.

 

please let us know how this turns out--I'm in the same boat--send the F's to be exchanged for free or just assume they will suck and have someone work on the F's. I'm thinking I need to stop buying Pelikan Pens...

 

 

Okay guys let us remember one thing Pelikan gets their nibs from Bock. The pen bodies are very good pens. Take the M605, you can pick that up for $119, what other pen with a piston filler and 18k nib of that size can you get for that price? So if you have to spend another $30-$40 getting the nib customized, so what. Yes I know you should not have to, but to have a pen that holds that much ink and is that reliable then modify the nib.

 

Otherwise, that just means more for me! thumbup.gif

 

Where? :yikes:

Soli Deo Gloria!

 

Void your warranty, violate a user agreement, fry a circuit, blow a fuse, poke an eye out!

 

 

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Okay guys let us remember one thing Pelikan gets their nibs from Bock.

I don't believe this is the case, at least not currently. Pelikan's current nibs exhibit tip shaping that is absolutely uncharacteristic of Bock production.

sig.jpg.2d63a57b2eed52a0310c0428310c3731.jpg

 

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  • 3 years later...

I wonder why Pelikan could not make its factory EF nib as smooth as Japanese nibs (Sailor, Platinum, Piot and etc). If they keep getting the complaints on their EF nibs, they should fix their production method accordingly.

My collection: 149 EF/F/B/OBB, Collodi B/Twain F/Mann F, 146 M, Silver Barley F, M1000/M800 B'o'B/M800 Tortoise/Sahara/415 BT/215/205 Blue Demo, Optima Demo Red M/88 EF & Italic/Europa, Emotica, 2K/Safaris/Al-Stars/Vista, Edson DB/Carene BS, Pilot 845/823/742/743/Silvern/M90/Makies, Sailor Profit Realo M/KOP Makies/Profit Makies/Profit 21 Naginata MF&M/KOP/KOP Mosaiques/Sterling Silvers,Platinum #3776 Celluloids/Izumos/Wood pens/Sterling Silvers,YoL Grand Victorian, and more (I lost counting)

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A lot of water has flowed down the Leine since this thread was written. Pelikan's nibs are now made in house rather than by Bock, and their character has changed quite a lot. In general, I preferred the older Bock gold nibs as current ones are rounder and while smooth have less character and are prone to 'baby bottom' because they have been polished so much. I can't speak for the gold EFs, but the steel ones I have come across on M205s are not at all scratchy, and even have a hint of flex.

 

John

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As Peter Bock is a specialized manufacturer of nibs, they should know their business? Perhaps they even make better nibs than Pelikan can do themselves?

 

I'd rather buy a Goodyear/Michelin/Continetal car tyre for use on my car than a tyre produced by the car maker...

"Le vase donne une forme au vide, et la musique au silence"

Georges Braque

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My recently purchased m805 has a wonderful EF nib. It's similar to a Japanese F but it's butter smooth. No real flex but a very cushioned ride. It's a very easy nib to use. Don't know how to tell who made it but it was purchased recently.

 

Cheers,

NM

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  • 1 year later...

My 120 M&K has a wonderful EF. I got it as uninked NOS last fall.It is more than fine enough for my needs. I haven't tried a modern Pelikan EF yet, so can't compare.

Brad

"Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind" - Rudyard Kipling
"None of us can have as many virtues as the fountain-pen, or half its cussedness; but we can try." - Mark Twain

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  • 3 weeks later...

I wanted to replace my m400 F-nib with a EF-nib as a factory replacement.

Now I am in a dilemma whether to really go for an EF one :wacko:

Get a nibmeister one. Pel EF stock is hopelessly bad qc
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  • 2 weeks later...

Get a nibmeister one. Pel EF stock is hopelessly bad qc

I had ordered a pelikan m405 with EF nib. Thankfully it came out nice. A quite thinner line as below: (a bit of feedback is felt for all the nibs on this relatively cheap paper & for EF it's a bit pronounced compared to others)

http://s16.postimg.org/op04xokv9/IMG_2552.jpg

Edited by soniknitr

You have come to earth to entertain and to be entertained - P.Y

 

Some Pen & Paraphernalia Reviews

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  • 4 weeks later...

At the SF Pen Show I swapped my B nib for an XF nib on my M200, and it is a nice writer.

I found the trick is to stay on the rather small sweet spot, so the ink flow lubricates the tip as it moves on the paper.

Roll/rotate the pen left or right and you are off the sweet spot with a reduced flow of ink, and thus more friction with the paper. And it looks like the pen is misbehaving at this point, but it is simply not on the sweet spot of the nib. Rotate the pen so the nib is level, and on the sweet spot, and all is well again.

 

The ink line of my Pelikan XF nib compares to my old US Parker F nibs, both using Cross/Pelikan ink.

San Francisco Pen Show - August 28-30, 2020 - Redwood City, California

www.SFPenShow.com

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I have a Pelikan EF M200 nib which came from Richard Binder - it is not ground down from a F as speculated earlier in this thread, it's a factory EF that Richard "Binderizes" to ensure smoothness and flow, at the "normal" nib price.

 

I also have a custom ground .6mm stub M200 nib from him. Love both.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I am rather new to fountain pens (but not completely new). I started with a Pilot Prera (solid Royal Blue color with Medium nib) and a Lamy Safari (Yellow with EF nib) a month or so ago and have definitely been bitten by the fountain pen bug! I am not all that happy with my Safari--don't love the triangular grip section--nor with my Prera--it has false starts (I guess that's what you call them) and skips--it occasionally just won't put down ink, and at this point I don't think it's my technique (or lack thereof).

 

I have admired the M205 since I saw it a month or so ago and I read a lot about it. Rather inconsistent experiences with that pen, it seems! Some love it, some want to love it but find the whole M205 experience sour due to the nib not performing as it should, etc. So, I figured that despite how much I loved the classic look of the pen and the fact that it was a piston filler and that it has that lovely ink window (some don't like that, but I really do), that I would avoid the M205. I went for a Pilot Custom 74 instead as my next pen.

 

However . . . the 74 I got wrote HORRIBLY! Doing a little research turned up a review from this site where the reviewer mentioned that on all three of his 74's he had to bend the tines apart in order to get the flow right. Being a novice, I didn't want to try to bend the tines of an expensive pen. Plus, even when capped tightly with cap turned down as tightly as I dared, the cap wiggled back and forth--not acceptable to me.

 

So . . .

 

I returned the 74 to the company I got it from (not CFP's) and decided on a white M205 with an M400 two tone 14k EF nib installed from Classic Fountain Pens. I loved the idea that the nib would be tested and tuned and tweaked by John Mottishaw to ensure proper function BEFORE being sent out to me! And, as I said, I just love the look of the M205 pen, and that it is a light pen, a piston filler, with an ink window, that it has such clean lines, etc.

 

I chose the EF nib because I read that a Pelikan EF isn't even as fine as a Lamy Safari EF. This seemed about right to me, as I'd like a nib that is wider than a Safari EF, but narrower than a Safari F or a Pilot M.

 

I hope that I don't find that it is a scratchy nib! I'd be very disappointed and would probably exchange the whole setup for something else from CFP's. I really really want a pen that writes smoothly (feedback is fine, scratchiness is not) and reliably with a nice fine (but not too fine) line. If I need to go to another brand I will, but I love the form and general styling of the Pelikans and I hope the M205 w/ M400 EF nib works out for me. We shall see!

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Jim

Remember that ink, paper and your hand has a lot to do with how scratchy (or how much feedback) the pen feels.

Did you tell John what ink you use?

I have used paper that I will NEVER use a F or XF nib on, because the scratchy feeling coming up the pen is just too irritating. Those notebooks are going to the nephews for their kids to use in school.

If you press down on the pen, pushing the nib onto the paper, you will feel more of the surface texture of the paper. You need to write with a light hand.

 

I would say that the Pelikan XF is about the same as a Lamy XF, at least mine looks that way.

But ink selection also affect the width of the ink line; wet ink = wider ink line, dry ink = narrower ink line.

San Francisco Pen Show - August 28-30, 2020 - Redwood City, California

www.SFPenShow.com

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ac12,

 

Thanks for your post!

 

I have a bunch of different ink samples and cartridges and have gone a little crazy over the last few weeks having fun testing out new inks. For my main black ink I settled on Iroshizuku Take-Sumi (Bamboo Charcoal), which is nice black ink that flows well. I could definitely tell the difference between Take-Sumi and the Lamy cartridge black, not only in color (Take-Sumi is blacker), but more importantly in how well it flows--how much ink gets on the paper. The Take-Sumi in the Lamy with EF nib is a nice combination. I also like it just fine with my Fine nib (love how easy it is to change nibs on the Safari). It's not too much flow. Same with my Prera, although the flow with the Pilot black cartridge vs. Take-Sumi wasn't that much different I don't think.

 

I tried other samples from the Iroshizuku line, as well as a number from the Diamine and J. Herbin inks. All seemed to work well in my Pilot Prera with Medium nib. But the next full bottle I bought was the Iroshizuku Shin-Kai, which I just love. Such a great blue-black!

 

For paper, I am using--pretty much exclusively--Rhodia 80 gram dot pad and Clairefontaine 90 g wirebound notebooks--and both pens write well on these papers. The Prera on copy paper isn't scratchy, but it puts down a lot of ink! Same for Lamy Fine. The Extra-Fine is noticeably more scratchy (but still smooth enough for me) on junk paper, but the line is still acceptably narrow and it doesn't feather or bleed through as much.

 

As for pressure and technique, that is definitely on my radar. From what I have read so far, the technique I started with wasn't at all bad--I wasn't writing in a cramped or straight up-and-down pen position. I naturally (i.e. habitually) hold my pen the way that the Lamy Safari triangular grip makes you hold a pen, and I hold it at about a 45 degree angle, etc. I have also definitely lightened up the amount of pressure I use now that I write with fountain pens. Love this (and everything else) about fountain pens! But, I've learned that I'm more of a "finger-writer" than I should be and am working to write more from the shoulder muscles. See http://www.paperpenalia.com/handwriting.html for more info (no affiliation--just found it to be a great page for handwriting tips).

 

So, I'm definitely down with the notion that paper and ink and writing technique are a part of the equation here. But, it seems to me that the basic message of this thread was that, all other things being equal--or, rather, factoring out the paper and ink and technique contributions--that the Pelikan EF nibs were unacceptably scratchy. So much so that Richard Binder would go to the trouble of grinding a Pelikan fine down to an extra-fine instead of selling a tweaked and tuned stock extra-fine!

 

This concerns me!

 

But, I also read comments that made me think that the newer Pelikan EF nibs don't have this problem, especially if they are inspected and tuned by a nib meister.

 

Is this a fair summary of this thread so far?

Edited by Jim Sexton
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I think you are hearing the noise.

What I mean is, generally the people with problems make noise, the people without problems say nothing. So you hear more noise.

This is not to say that there isn't a problem, but the problem may not be as big as it seems.

 

As I mentioned, I have a XF nib on my M200, and it writes just fine, with Cross/Pelikan blue ink.

But mine is a sample size of 1, not a good representation of the population of XF nibs.

 

If you are interested in the XF from Binder, I would contact Binder to verify that he would grind down a F into a XF, rather than use a XF and tune the XF.

Personally, grinding down a F into a XF sounds like extra work to charge you more $.

 

I would also contact nibs.com (John Montishaw another nib meister) and ask them the same question.

But from what you said, John will tune the XF nib, not grind down a F into a XF.

 

I personally have no problem in ordering a XF nib on a new Pelikan, or a XF nib for one of my Pelikans.

I have basic nib working skills to adjust/tweak a new nib, but no where near a nib meister.

 

One thing to remember is that the M2xx nibs are not expensive nibs. So Pelikan cannot put a lot of time into the nibs, or they will loose money. So the do an acceptable production job. Then it is up to the user to get it "fine tuned" if is it not acceptable. It may be something as simple as the tines are slightly out of alignment. Patience, a good 10x loupe and a little delicate adjustment of the tines, and 95% of my scratchy nibs are fixed. The M4xx nib, on the other hand are much more expensive, and probably has a bit more work put into them.

 

gud luk, hope the M205 + XF M400 nib comes out to be what you expect.

Edited by ac12

San Francisco Pen Show - August 28-30, 2020 - Redwood City, California

www.SFPenShow.com

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My stock XF nib on an m800 was badly mis-aligned. I sent it out to a nibmeister to to make it a bit finer and reduce the flow.

If you use dry ink such ask stock pelican inks it will write a fine line. If you use wet inks such as waterman blue or pilot asa-gao it will vomit large quantities of ink on the paper and the line will be much wider and will take a long time to dry.

Are stock Pelikan nibs "fine" enough, I think so as long as you use pelikan/dry inks.

I like pilot iro. inks so I had mine reground and adjusted.

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I do not have any contemporary Pelikan with EF nib.

I have a vintage gray Pelikan 140 with EEF nib.

There is not scratching and a pen writes softly and pleasantly.

I believe that the old nibs were much better than the contemporary.

post-65485-0-39839000-1413315030_thumb.jpg

post-65485-0-04052500-1413315040_thumb.jpg

post-65485-0-30001000-1413315050_thumb.jpg

post-65485-0-66162700-1413315062_thumb.jpg

regards

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