Yesterday I wore my gray pinstriped suit to work. When I got to the office, I reached into my pocket to pull out the Noodler's Black-loaded Esterbrook J and - pulled out the cap. Uh Oh, where's that pen? Digging down, I finally found it, down in the bottom of the pocket, its contents drained away. Yikes! And on the front of the jacket, a silver dollar sized black stain, still damp. I rushed off to the men's room, soaked in cool water, rubbed with hand soap, rinsed multiple times, and got a lot of ink out. But the stain, well I don't hold much hope for recovering from it. I took the jacket, wet and with a dark gray spot, to the dry cleaner, and they're giving it a 50/50 chance; I'll find out next Monday.

What's your "big spill" story?

I am very sorry about your mishap. I had something very similar happen to me on a straw-coloured, brand new suit, where both the jacket AND skirt were stained.

Am I right in understanding that Amodex would do nothing for Noodler's waterproof inks? I haven't tried yet - I guess I should.

If it would have been regular ink, I would have recommended Amodex and nothing else, trying to absorb the ink with blotting paper while you rub the other side, instead of running it under water because it tends to spread the stain. (I didn't know that at the time, and finished ruining the suit as I tried to clean it.) But with Noodler's black....

Very similar to yours, only the jacket in question was fairly pale and by the time I noticed what had happened the stain was at least 4" across.... Luckily it was a relatively harmless washable ink and it eventually all came out.

Much the same happened to a shirt pocket, only I discovered it before the stain was more than half an inch. By then, however, I had discovered the joys of Noodler's ink and this was Nightshade. Nevertheless, after repeated applications of Oxyclean, Amodex and laundry detergent, the stain became more-or-less invisible. It was interesting to watch the colour changes along the way - from blackish purplish brown through washed-out magenta to washed-out aqua....

Simon

This happened to me once, many years ago, when the pen slipped out of its cap in my inner coat pocket.

Since then, I have tried to carry my pens in a pen case. No mishaps so far with that, except that I once lost a couple of pens when the pen case fell out of my pocket. (I had removed the coat and did not notice that the pens were missing when I put it back on.

Amodex, a water-based stain remover, will remove a "bulletproof" Noodler's stain from non-cellulose fabrics such as wool, silk, polyester, acrylic and nylon.

Amodex took a dried spot of Noodler's Black right off of my red silk shirt, leaving no evidence behind.

Nothing will remove a "bulletproof" Noodler's stain from cellulose fabrics such as cotton, linen, rayon, ramie, hemp, kenaf or jute, unless cutting out the stained area counts as removal.

A heavy Noodler's "bulletproof" stain on non-cellulose fabric might take more work to remove, but it should still come out. Robert, I hope your coat has no cellulose and that the cleaners succeed.

I created a thread for stories like this in the "Writing Instruments" board...

...but since we're here - I dropped a 2/3 full bottle of calligraphy ink onto the carpet of my bedroom once when I was a little boy.

The stain it left behind was anything but little.

Back to Robert Hughes' original story - I also just learned the hard way not to carry Esterbrooks in my shirt pocket. It was a shirt that I was about to give up on, so no great tragedy.

I hope other folks know this - the caps tend to come off rather easily on the Esties.

Erick

One of the few advantages of a polyester suit.

Maybe I should reconsider my love of linen.

I had a similar incident as the original poster. I had a semi-decent casual shirt on (non-work). When I reached into my pocket I found only the cap of my Pelikan 400. I dug down and found the Pelikan, along with a large blue spot of ink. I took the shirt home and washed it (read gave it to the better half to wash). The stain was 100% gone after a single washing in normal soap and water.

With an ink spot the difficulty is a function of:
-how long the ink has been there
-what kind of ink
-what kind of fabric

In my instance it was Waterman Florida Blue (very washable), normal cotton (does well with a normal washing), and the stain was still fairly recent (very good).

Suit materials make for poor clean up (dry cleaning is often the best option, and even that is imperfect and expensive). Heavy black inks (Aurora or the like) are very difficult to clean up, even when the stain is recent too.

Well, that's what I thought, too, until a friend of mine removed a fat Hunter Green stain from her creamy white pair of linen trousers with 'bile soap' (- I'm not entirely sure about this translation, "Gallseife", a common stain remover here?) and no problem at all. She didn't even get a chance to do anything to the stain right away but removed it days later when it had already dried (no feathering, though, as usual with Noodler's ).
So I think there's hope for the OP. Good luck, Robert!

I never like to tighten the cap on vintage Sheaffer's Balance pens, thus I lost a shirt to a very large black ink spot.

Though the Pelikan's threads are very good and uncaps very nicely, the downside is that I would not carry it around. I have learnt that unless essential, I carry pens only with washable blue in them in my shirt pockets and with a firm cap. I am now using a fabric pen sleeve (to avoid damage to both my phone and the pen banging around in the same pocket), but that may not prevent the ink stain.

In 50 years, I have only had one pen decide to dump its contents on me. As luck would have it, I was using black ink that day and I was wearing my black (clergy) habit, so the accident was not too apparent. Usually, I knock over bottles of ink at home. But I have managed to knock over a bottle or three at work so I could mess up a good day's work on my desk.

But, such spills are part of life with FP's. They do make good stories, though.

Yesterday, I have found a black ink spot on my Egyptian cotton bed sheet. Yes, I do write my morning pages (Julia Cameron) in my bed, and I use multiple pens with three black inks - Noodler's Eel Bulletproof, Montblanc, and Waterman. But all my pens behave. I still don't know which one of my beloved ones did it and what kind of ink it was.

I am premeditating murder of the spot now. Just out of curiosity, if it's Noodler's - would cutting it out with scissors be the only way to get rid of it?

Try multiple treatments of Amodex, following the instructions that come with the Amodex. You should be able to at
least fade the spot. It depends on the ink. I had turquoise ink leak into the pocket of a WHITE denim (cotton,
with cellulose) jacket. Amodex followed by laundering did remove enough of the spot to make the jacket
presentable on the outside. There may have been a faint shadow inside the pocket, but it wasn't visible from
the outside. You must be persistent and keep applying and re-applying.

There is another product called Kiss-Off (stick of white cleaner) that you can get from art supply outlets. I've
had good results with it, too. Both of these will require multiple applications.

I'd avoid Ink Nix on fabric, myself, because it feels to me like it has small particles of an abrasive in it,
which would help scrub ink out of the ridges on your fingers, but is likely to damage fabrics.

My other mileage is that it REALLY depends on the ink. MB Violett is made up of a fluorescent magenta and
black. The flourescent magenta is removed after multiple Amodex treatments, but a grey shadow can remain.

Best of luck.

anyone besides me absent mindedly forget that a Preppy eyedropper pen has a cap that pulls off, not screws off? oops.

I tend to assume that a disposable-looking pen like the Preppy is a pull-off, so it hasn't been an issue for me. I do find, though, that if I use a pull-off for a few days, I start trying to pull off my screw-ons, until I get my head screwed on straight -- if you catch my drift.

(reminding oneself myself: facts before theory, facts before theory) Would Gallseife help a person win the Noodler's prize (up to $5000 USD now?), or would Gallseifewaßer still leave a trace of "alarm" dyes and let the prize money keep accumulating? Mr. Tardif, have you tried this one?

Good news! I got my jacket back from the dry cleaners, and the Noodler's Black stain is - gone! Without a trace. Let's hear it for wool suits and dry cleaning services.

Awesome news, Robert!

Noodlers may owe the drycleaner $100 for removing his ink from cellulose (I assume wool contains cellulose).

Wool does not, actually. Only plant fibers would.

Wool is protein, keratin in fact, like fingernails (and hair, gasp!!!)

Nary a cellulose in sight...

Unless, you count the bits that get stuck to the wool while it's on
the sheep.

Sometimes, if you knit with minimally processed wool yarn, you
do find dried vegetation bits tangled into the yarn. I normally pull
or wriggle these out if I find them. These are usually brownish,
and look like they did not take the dye at all. The veg bits have
cellulose, but the part that grew on the sheep is protein...

I am not an expert on dyes, but I believe that the chemistry is
different depending upon whether you are trying to change the
color of cellulose fibers (cotton, linen, rayon) versus protein
fibers (wool, alpaca, silk, cashmere). Note that polyester and
polypropylene are plastic petroleum fibers, so they don't fit
into either of the above...

I'd rather not say. I just finished paying the therapist's bill.

So if you write the phone number of that luscious blonde on your hand using a Noodler's Bulletproof ink, it won't stay??
Oops.

It'll stay long enough for you to get access to your "little black book" (does that idiom work in 'Strine?) or electronic organizer .

Not so much a "big spill," but since I usually wear black and usually use black ink, I didn't notice that the cap had come loose from my pen in my pocket until I saw an inexplicable black stain on my thigh. Oops.

For a moment, it was such a mystery....

I wear black trousers because I work with large format graphics inkjet printers, and it doesn't show the stains. Somehow I had managed to get a large blob of black fountain pen ink on the trousers without noticing. And the black ink, dried into the black trousers, didn't show up.

Until I got wet in the rain. When I changed, there was this large grey/black mark, with hints of red, on my leg. I couldn't remember bumping something there, and it was a funny looking bruise anyway. When it faded significantly in the shower, light dawned, and a close examination of the trouser leg showed the blacker stain in the black trousers...

When the top came off, I broke a pen (the nib section) in my jeans pocket while sitting down. It was not real noticeable until I went on break. It stained my leg and my ahh... naughty bits a bright blue! Hysterical laughter resulted when I did a show and tell at home. My girlfriend asked if there was anything she could do and I said "Well this coat is dry, think it needs a second coat?" We laughed so hard, we cried.

I suppose that gives a whole new meaning to the term 'blue balls'.

I succeeded in spilling what must've been a 1/3 full cap of ink onto one of my pairs of tan trousers once. I was uncapping my Duofold and forgot that, since it had been jostled around in my bag all day, it might have some ink in the cap.

It went all down my arm and my trousers caught a few, generous drops.

I now keep all my pens in pen-cases, nib-up, on my person, not bouncing around loosely in my bag!

Nearly had one the other day - but thankfully, it wasn't me who was about to be inked and the crisis was narrowly avoided.

The Boyfriend's mother asked to see my darling little Sheaffer Fineline and was holding it, nib down, and now I quote from the conversation:

TBM: "What does this little gold bar on the outside do?" ::finger heading toward lever, ready to pull:: (It happened in slow motion, I swear.)

Atlanta: ::lunging from recliner where she had been so thoroughly relaxed and watching baseball only moments before:: "Nooooooooooooooooo don't do that!!"

It would have been bad, too: a cream-color leather sofa and Baystate Blue? I wish the dog was white and had been sitting on her lap at the time. Now that's comedy.

A few months ago, my 2 year old daughter and I were sleeping in one morning when I woke up to find her missing from the bedroom. Searching the house, I realized she was in the spare bedroom with the door locked...where my fountain pens and ink were located at the time, because we were using it as an office. Upon opening the door, I discovered my daughter quietly playing with a brand-new, but now empty, bottle of J. Herbin Violette Pensée.

She was Violet from head to toe, sitting in a puddle of Violet, on the typical contractor grade beige carpeting.

It took an hour and a half long bath for her, and several hours of carpet cleaning for me, going through at least 10-12 changes of the big carpet cleaning machine, along with a few changes of the small one, to get the carpet as clean as I was ever going to get it. You almost can't see the stain...

Fortunately for me, her mother was at work that day, though I *did* have to tell her about the incident. Had I been able to think more clearly at the time, I would have taken pictures.

I'm seriously thinking about changing her name from Madeleine to Violette...

I was wearing a polo shirt without a pocket the other day, so I had two pens clipped to the button band. One was filled with Noodlers Tiananmen, the other with PR Orange Crush. Well, I was called across the offices on a support issue. The lady who called me, looked at me and said, "Are you bleeding?" I looked down, and on the front of my jeans (this was a Friday) was a huge Red-Orange spot. Confused for a second, I reached for the Retro ED Scriptmaster (loaded with Orange Crush). The cap was attached but no pen. The body had unscrewed from the cap (I had not tightened it properly), and had fallen down inside my shirt. I had been sitting at my desk leaned forward, so my belly was pressing the nib against the shirt, and the shirt against my pants.

I went home, changed, treated the stains with Amodex, washed in cold water with Oxyclean, and repeat five times. The shirt, being dark grey, does not show the remnants, but the stone washed pants have a rather large light pink spot...Apparently the yellow in OC washes right out, but the red dye bonds to cotton....

I can really relate to this - exactly the same happened to me. I only noticed the stain long after I'd taken my trousers off and sat there wondering where it came from for hours!