Fountain pens mentioned ...

[cmeisenzahl]

The write stuff

Times Online - UK

... The first draft is longhand on A4 ruled sheets with a fountain pen. I have had various pens along the way, then at my fortieth I got given a Mont Blanc. ...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,30...2399235,00.html

 

Artist uses skills to tell story from courtroom

Contra Costa Times - CA,USA

... bench by the courthouse. She outlines the penciled images with a black fountain pen before getting out a palette of watercolors. ...

http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctime...ia/15730088.htm

 

Memories of other visits merely ‘hazy’

Columbus Dispatch - Columbus, OH, USA

... for about 35 or 40 years, and he has been keeping a diary — "What I did every day." He has these stacked in his apartment and always has a fountain pen. ...

http://www.columbusdispatch.com/features-s...1010-B1-03.html

[pigpogm]

Thanks for pointing those out, Chris - I've pinched the Times one for PigPog. A bit worrying that Mont Blanc claim their fountain pens rot on contact with fountain pen ink. That would seem like a bit of a design flaw to me :blink:

[Rique]

Does the MB user´s manual really say that?? I´ve never had one, so I can´t check. You MB owners, can you confirm that?? Absolutely ridiculous!

[Kalessin]

Does the MB user´s manual really say that?? I´ve never had one, so I can´t check. You MB owners, can you confirm that?? Absolutely ridiculous!

Older MB owners' manuals didn't say that MB's would rot with ink (or with other makers' ink), and I'm fairly sure that modern manuals don't either. This sounds like something a jewelry store or boutique salesman would say to get the customer to keep buying MB ink from them. I've also heard rumour of salesmen or service people insisting that the customer only use the same brand of ink as the pen to avoid factory warranty woes (this practice, as far as I know, isn't legal in the US).

 

The closest they come on the fountain-pen care section of their website is to say: "Important: use only Montblanc fountain pen ink." Most pen makers say something like this, they'd prefer to sell you their ink, and keeping the income flowing is why it's "important".

 

The only real MB ink warning that I know of is to be careful with the MB Blue-Black ink because it's a ferro-gallic ink, and can clog if not rinsed out more often than non-ferrous ink.

[pigpogm]

I thought it sounded a bit odd. A bit like Ford warning people not to use petrol in their cars, because it's highly flamable.

 

Mind you, almost all the bottled water we buy here is marked with warnings not to refill the bottles, and I think my old Olympus camera had warnings to only use Olympus branded memory cards in it.