Dear Colleagues,

I have my eye on the following fountain pens:

1) Cross Townsend Medallist - 23k Plated Gold Nib and Silver / Gold Accents.
2) Cross Townsend 18K Nib Rolled Gold Fountain Pen

Does anyone have any personal experience of the above two pens?....I would like to know which is the better writer in terms of wetness and smoothness.

Which one would you purchase and why?.

Thanks,

Kavanagh

I have four Townsends in various size nibs and another one to arrive any day now. In my opinion, you can't go wrong with a Townsend. In the four I have currently, two have 18K nibs, one has a steel nib, and one is a Medalist with the gold-plated steel nib. They all write equally well - I really can't tell the difference which makes me wonder if it makes sense to put out the extra money for 18K. But that's just me.

Judybug

I have two Townsend fountain pens. One is a 10 k rolled gold and the other is the medalist. Both are in medium nib. Both appear to write the same. I wish I had gotten one nib in fine, but that can happen on the next one. I like the weight of the medalist. They are heavy for extended writing. I have unposted for long correspondences.

Good luck in your decision.

My Townsend came with a 14k M nib. Works great, great writer.

I own the 18K townsend with a fine nib. The lines are a little wet for my taste as my smaller letters will clump up into a small dot of ink. I had to adjust my lettering a bit by writing a little larger to compensate. I wish I had gone extra fine, but that's more because of my own handwriting style. Not necessarily a bad thing though, people have commented my writing is a bit more legible since I've started writing larger.

I will say that it is the smoothest writing pen I've ever used. But I haven't used the medallist you're looking at too - so I can't offer any kind of comparison.

Good luck!

I have the 18K rolled gold version of the Townsend, and it is a very nice writer.... and a very nice looker, too! I am fond of gold pens. Silver is nice, but gold is nicer.

Better buy soon, because the Townsend versions are going out of production one by one. I think the 18K gold is already stopped, with just the 10K still being produced. Does anyone know for sure?