Hi FPN-ers,

Here is another review, of Waterman Florida Blue this time, as I threatened in another thread.

A slightly bland ink, IMO, but a very good performer for everyday writing, in pens with "normal"nibs.

One of the great advantages of this ink is its washability. It rinses out quite easily. After the review it took me only a few minutes for each pen to rinse and flush it properly, and remove all traces of the ink. Contrast this with Noodler's Ottoman Rose, which took about half an hour to an hour per pen, depending on the type of ink reservoir .

Anyway, here is page 1 of 3:


Page 2 of 3:


Page 3 of 3:


Page 4 of 3:


Conclusion: great ink for everyday use, provide you like the colour. Personally, I only happen to have it in the ink collection to complete the set of Waterman inks. It doesn't normally get used around the house. However, it is another good ink for priming nibs.

I hope you enjoy the review.

Warm regards, Wim

edit: Added page 4 of 3 to rectify a incorrect statement made, due to a tine misalignment.

Wim,
Another stellar review! I agree with you that WM FB is a little bland regarding color. It's a shame, really, as the ink is superb in every other respect IMHO.
southpaw

Oh my! Maybe I should have waited a few days--I have some WM FB on the way--and I use sharpened to crisp italic nibs, most about 0.8 - 0.9 mm! I'll let you know if my experience is the same as yours with these nibs.

Thanks for another great review, Wim.

Ann

Ann, don't worry about your order. Just mix Florida Blue with Purple 1:1 and you get something very close to Tanzinite without the ex-lax effect or smearing. I got this tip from Richard.

Elaine - thank for the wonderful tip on the mixing. I'll try it in the near future as I have both on hand. Probably be one day next week - this week is swamped! THANKS again!

Elaine,

I saw on PT awhile back where Richard mixes these two colors, but I thought this was for color altering purposes, not for flow altering.

Wim says: "Flow of this ink is average, and it seems to perform best with standard types of nibs, as demonstrated in the first few paragraphs. With this 0.9 mm cursive italic it has considerably more problems, ..."

Maybe I'm mistaking what you are trying to tell me. My concern was that I ordered the ink because I thought I may like the color--I don't want to have to mix it with something that would change the color in order to be able to use it!

Ann

I wouldn't say FB is bland. Rather, it is *conservative*. It is indeed a classic blue, and WM inks do well in mixes. Give it a try straight in your crisp italics Ann. You may find it suits your purposes just fine.

Aha! :doh: I think I was mixing up the Tanzinite thread with this one. My brain without enough estrogen went something like this: Wim wrote review on WM FB, Ann has some coming and now she doesn't think she'll like the color after all [brain took a detour. Wrong reason for worrying about ink, and somehow Tanzinite got thrown into the mix (probably borrowed from the Tanzinite thread) and I came up with a great use for the ink on the way. Of course that's only if the problem was not liking the color.

Hi Ann, Elaine,

Let me try to put this straight a bit. I only had problems, writing at my usual speed, with a single nib. And that is a little dry writing anyway. Flow can be adjusted, but as I generally use a free flowing ink with that nib and pen, it isn't normally a problem.

The other Pelikan nibs used here were ok with the ink, but they write a little wetter. I found, in general, that Pelikan nibs have more problems with certain inks, like Skrip Burgundy, MD inks, most Waterman inks, some Noodler's inks, unless they are tuned for a higher ink flow.

And, Ann, increasing ink flow is very easy to do yourself, by the way, so if you do have problems, just ask, and I'll provide instructions for increasing the ink flow. It'll take you probably all of two (2) minutes to accomplish.

HTH, warm regards, Wim

Hi Leslie,
Well, yes, maybe I am a little spoiled with 32 bottles of ink and another 8 on the way (owww, did I really say that?), plus a bunch of KCat Sampling System Samples (KCSSS). And I like to "shock" people at work, by varying colours and pens and nibs as I write notes during a meeting...

Call me mad...

Warm regards, Wim

Hi Southpaw,

Thanks for the kind words!

Warm regards, Wim

Wim, Elaine, & Leslie,

I appreciate that you've each tried to help regarding my forthcoming WM FB.

Elaine, now it makes sense where you were coming from! You thought I was worried about not liking the color.

Wim, if I do have a problem--well--I'm reluctant about what I think you're suggesting! (If you're suggesting that I adjust my nib to be a wetter writer.) I like drier writing pens. Please set me straight if I've misinterpreted what you meant.
Regardless, I appreciate the offer of help.

Leslie, indeed I will try the WM FB straight out of the bottle. If it doesn't flow well in any of the pens I would want to use it in, or if I don't like for any reason, I will put it up for sale.

Thanks again folks,
Ann

Waterman Florida Blue is "Ze Blou", as I say after 8 pm Great colour. Unfortunately, after using it for 20-some years of school, I'm just bored to death with it... a shame because it is truly a great ink.

Hi Ann,
I just finished another review , which I will post tonight sometime, and I found I had problems with the same nib. Also, from what I could remember, this was a medium wet writer, so I checked the nib, and it appeared to be slightly misaligned and I corrected this.
I´ll give it another go tonight, with WM FB (haven´t got it with me right now) to see how it performs now, but I reckon, that might have just been it. I had to write quite slowly and deliberately with it, as I mentioned, but it should be ok now.

I´ll come back on this later tonight.

However, regardless of this, I still think this ink looks better from a wet writer, but then, I like strong colours . You may be fine with it.

Regarding your interpretation, you are right, that was what I meant, adjusting the ink flow. It is very easy, honestly. Of course, if you don´t want to do that, that is fine too.

Warm regards, Wim

Hi Ann,

I added page 4 of 3 of the review , due to the fact that the pen and nib wrote all right with Waterman Florida Blue after the nib alignment :doh:. So, you don't have to worry anymore . Sorry about that

Warmest regards, Wim

So glad to see the info on page "4 of 3" ! Can't wait for my Flordia Blue to arrive to see if I get the same good results!

Best regards,
Ann

Hi Ann,

I'm sure you'll get better results! Your writing is marvelous, so no competition!

Warm regards, Wim

Awesome review Wim. I have been using Private Reserve DC Supershow Blue for the past few days. I've been enjoying it, but something just wasn't right. The color, while supersaturated, stressed me out a bit. Shaded areas looked too dark. Took too long to dry and smudged even when I thought it had dried. Too hard to wash out of pens. Got home, flushed the Supershow Blue out of my current two daily writers and replaced it with Florida Blue. Ah, now that's more like it. I can see how this color may be bland, but to me it is peaceful. This is the color I imagine when I think "blue."

I too am greatly enjoying florida blue. I had been using noodler's gulfstream blue and PR supershow blue (2004). But since I recently bought a waterman pen and it came with some cartridges, I thought "why not try 'em"? I'm glad I did. I too find the waterman blue color to be peaceful. Perhaps it's because I'm new to the ink, but I don't find the color to be bland or ordinary at all. I'm really enjoying it. I expect it'll stay in my rotation of frequently used inks from now on.

Different strokes for different folks. Great review as usual Wim.

Ceci

This is my ink of choice, beautiful, earasable and classy.

I love it, I love it, I love it. It is my most used ink without a doubt. It's perfect for my 3 wet writer blue fountain pens and doesn't clog my rollinks.

I used it for as long as Denis, (may be longer), and there is no sign of being bored with it what so ever.

Florida Blue rules!!!

(first post)

I have found this blue to be a "blue blue" from my Pelikan Epoch w/medium nib. As someone earlier said, it is the color I think of when I think of "blue." Not watery, not navy, not sky blue, just plain, solid, beautiful blue.

Now I need to find a red that is as "red" as this one is "blue."

- Greg

Greg: I think you've given the definitive short summary of Florida Blue. It's my favorite ink!

Yes, Waterman Florida Blue is probably one of the best, if not the one, elections for inking Fountain Pens. my only problem with it has been already mentioned, after using it most of my life, one well, wants to venture into other ones.


Also, would like to comment that the mentioned 1:1 mixture Florida Blue/Purple is also well know in my environment for as long as I know. Gives a very insteresting color and somehow avoids the staining tendency of the purple. With to give it a try if you haven't already.

Edited to post new info:

I could not resist phoning my aunts this morning to refresh what I had heard years ago. One of them, 89 years old and looking like 60, said; "You can tell Mr. Binder that his Burple was made by all our Liceo students 80 years back and we called "Bleulette" from the "Bleu" and "violette" printed in the boxes" It washed off better than the plain violette and looked nice.
Although she cannot recall the brand of the ink, and she thinks that Herbin rings more of a bell to her than Waterman's.

This is my number one ink along with the Waterman Havana. I mix mine two parts blue to one part Waterman Purple. I've tried all kinds of blues, but kept coming back to this ink so much I just stayed. Great Review!

Have you checked out Waterman Red?

I haven't, but I sure wouldn't mind! Is it more of a true red than all of the Noodler's reds? I'd prefer to get more volume if there's no other difference.

WOW! What a wonderful in-depth review with lovely hand writing!!
Congrats Wimg! Alas I can not get this ink here in Kigali, Rwanda!!
Abhik.

Waterman Red is a nice bright red color. I use it for editing the documents prepared by my subordinates, and they tell me that the color reminds them of the red ink used by grade school teachers in the 1950s.

At the moment, I find myself prefering Waterman Florida Blue to PR American Blue -- it's brighter and I like the ever so slight violet tinge opposed to the greenish/gray I see in the PR.

Looking forward to trying some Blurple. Also, am looking forward to maybe trying some PR Lake Placid Blue.

Like a lot of folks, I think I'm looking for some magical blue -- bright (but not too), royal blue that stands out but is still okay for business use. Probably doesn't really exist, since the criteria are probably always shifting slightly one way or another, but the hunt is fun!

I love Florida Blue for all of the qualities listed here, yet I seem to go through more Aurora Blue than anything. I wish it had some reasonable water-resistance...

I like blue inks, and have more blues than anything else. FWIW Waterman Florida Blue remains the only ink that I've actually completely finished a bottle and am on number two. It is interesting - when I first bought a bottle of American Blue I thought "wow - what have I been missing?! I'll never use anything else again" because it was so, well, lush. But then the lustre wore off and I found how much it smudged even after dry, how long it took to dry, and how long it took to flush out of a Parker "51" when I wanted a change of pace. I recently picked up a bottle of Baystate Blue and it is almost flourescent. A neat color and useful for some purposes, but I'm not sure I want that much color all the time.

Meanwhile, Florida Blue is like homemade meat loaf and mashed potatoes on a cold rainy winter night. It isn't fancy, it isn't nouveau, but it is so comforting and never fails to satisfy on a deep level.

I have found myself gravitating a bit back to Waterman FB and Blue Black as my go to inks in some pens as the amazement of the super saturated has worn off a bit.

HesNot-I could not agree more with you. I have most of the PR inks and a large number of Noodlers. Lately I find myself gravitating back to Waterman inks. I particularly like the FB and BB shades. Diamine also goes a long way to producing a trouble free ink. This is not to say I do not ink up a pen with the saturated colors at time but for everyday go to inks-you cannot beat Waterman Florida Blue or Blue Black. These inks are just a joy to write with.