Last night after posting in [topic="24350"]the 'eccentric' ink thread[/topic] that I'd keep my bottle of Noodler's Polar Black in the freezer, I went ahead and put the bottle in there. Today I went to the freezer just to check it out. Much to my dismay, the ink is frozen solid.

I don't know what else to write. Phooey! "Guaranteed to flow freely at temperatures down to -20F and anecdotally tested at -110F"? I doubt that my household freezer compartment is any below +25F. I should try freezing some salt water and see what happens.

Do try the salt water. That will be an interesting test. I'm going to put some Polar black in the freezer right now. I'll report my results in a few hours.

Edit: Oops I lied. I no longer have Polar Black. I thought my eel black was polar. My bad.

Well, here's what I'm trying, in case "contents have settled." I've thawed the bottle of Polar Black, shaken it up as violently as I can, and placed it back in the freezer. Maybe the anti-freezing stuff was all on the bottom. I'll check it again tonight.

Hmm, that's interesting.

Actually I'd expect your freezer to hover around 0F and the main refrigerator to be at 38 to 40F. But that's still not -20F. Hmm.

Slightly OT, but there is another thread asking if fountain pen users are insane. And here we are putting our inks in the freezer...

Doug

I dunno. Ice cream comes out of my freezer pretty soft, but then I have no idea what the freezing point of Cherry Garcia is.

Well let me rephrase, your freezer ought to be at 0F for safe long-term food storage.

But my point really was that even if your freezer is at the "proper" temperature, that's still a long ways from -20F. So I'm puzzled if the ink is rated to -20F. At -20 you'd need a hammer and chisel to eat your Cherry Garcia.

I just checked my Whirlpool freezer with Fluke 179 temp probe and it is -1° F

I wish I had a polar black just to try that...

I may get one just to try that then!

Have you contacted the maker? I do not think shaking vs. not shaking should make it suddenly freeze.

My Samsung is reading -6F right now. I've got a bit of Polar Blue. Wonder what would happen?

Here's the update. After thawing the bottle and shaking it up I put it back in the freezer and left the house. I came back five hours later and checked and found that the ink seemed thick but still liquid. Encouraged, I capped the bottle, shook it up again, and replaced it in the freezer. At the same time, I thawed the salt water and added more salt.

Three hours later (just now) I checked the ink, and there's a tiny bit of fluid on top, but it's pretty much solid. The salt water froze solid in that time. The Haagen Dazs (sorry, no Cherry Garcia so the experiment may not be as scientifically sound as you'd hoped) is creamy and delicious and comes out of the container with a spoon, no chisel required.

So at this point I think I will write to Mr Tardiff. One would hope that rated for 20 below means that it should remain liquid at 20 below indefinitely, not just for a few hours.

I'm curious what the temperature of your freezer is. Salt water doesn't really tell you much. Adding a bunch of salt lowers the freezing point only 3 or 4 degrees at most, to 28F. The fact that your ice cream is not hard as a rock also implies that your freezer is "too warm" (ie. above zero), which makes your experience with the ink even more disturbing. Hmm.

I will test the polar blue I have when I get home next week.

Believe me if the results are similar I'll be none to happy as it's an excellent Ink, however I did buy it for it's freeze resistant nature.

I'm afraid I don't seem to own a thermometer, so I can't tell you what the temperature actually is.

I don't really find this experience all that disturbing anyhow. I'm sure that this was a bad bottle or part of a bad batch, not a reflection on the general performance of Polar inks from Noodler's.

Of course yes, it would have been very bad if I'd been counting on it for freeze resistance, but I wasn't, so it's not much of a big deal.

FYI, scoopable ice cream implies a temperature of 7F or so, or above.

I think you were begging for trouble. ;-)

If I was climbing a mountain (I weigh 195) I wouldn't do it w/ a rope rated for 196 pounds, I'd prefer a much greater margin of safety. ;-)

By the same token, here in DFW it seldom, if ever drops below zero, so I keep the cars antifreezed to - 20 degrees. A 20 degree margin of safety should suffice. If the freezer doesn't free ice cream hard, it is already above zero, so the ink failed a 20 plus degree margin of safety. If the temperature in DFW regularly dropped to -10, I would antifreeze the cars for -40, not -60. A ten degree margin might be questionable if one is conservative, but good to -10, and for short periods to -110, slightly above zero should NOT freeze it solid.

Donnie

You might try having the antifreeze in your car checked, to see how low it can go before freezing. I have mine done to -20, some do it to -40. But if yours is -20, and doesn't freeze in your freezer, then neither should the ink rated for -20.

Donnie

As water expands when frozen and ink is mostly water, be careful freezing your ink in a closed bottle or you may have a colorful freezer due to the bottle exploding.

Yeah, I thought of that, but when I put the bottle in the freezer I was assuming that it would not freeze. By the time I saw that it did, the bottle had already failed to explode.

And regarding my "margin of safety" the stuff is guaranteed to -20F but it's claimed to be good to -120F. So I had good reason to believe that there was nothing I could do short of putting the bottle in liquid nitrogen to make it freeze.

Either way, I'd rather find out that I have a bad bottle here in San Francisco where I have two dozen other bottles of ink and a half dozen stores I can buy more from than discover the ink frozen after I've gone backpacking alone in the tundra.

Well yes, but only because it's not important to you right at this moment. As an engineer I take written specifications and ratings very seriously. If it can't do it then don't put it on the label. If it's only good to +10F, that's fine, still way better than standard inks, but the specification needs to be accurate.

And I'm not bashing Noodlers. I'm a huge fan as you probably know. Nearly all 16 inks I have are Noodlers. But I would like to know what's going on here. Maybe you do have a bad batch and if so then Nathan needs to know about it.

I sent him a PM here but it looks like he logs in once every few weeks and I haven't found another way to contact him. I probably still have the receipt and I suppose I could take the bottle to the store where I bought it, except that I'm sure that wouldn't actually get information about what was wrong back to Nathan. And they might very well refuse to exchange or refund an item where I didn't discover the flaw for eight or nine months, even with my receipt.

I think that this polar ink is a funny ink, and I would love to know if it was truly borne of a desire to have a freeze-proof ink, or if freeze-proof was an interesting side effect.

Here's the deal: does anyone use their fountain pen in condition which would require a freeze-proof ink? I would like to know about it! It seems that if your pen needs to not freeze, then you must be writing with it with a big huge glove on. Because if you do not have a glove on, then the conditions are not that cold!

And then, what are you writing on? Normal paper? It would have to be normal paper because anything else will not work well with a fountain pen.

So what, you are writing in your moleskine with your inch-think fleece mitten?


It is fairly cold where I live, and I spend a bit of time standing and walking outside (public transportation). The change in temperature from my bag while outside to my pocket while inside causes what I consider to be a considerable amount of condensation. I see this mostly inside the caps of my demos, but I also see it quite a bit on the nib of my Pelikan M800. If I were in conditions which would require a freeze-proof ink, this condensation would freeze. In fact, the cap might even freeze on my pen!

I am running through the scenarios. I can't imagine using a fountain pen in extreme cold condition. Perhaps I will write to some field researchers in Antarctica and ask them!

Me? I'd reach for the Fisher space pen.

My guess is the applications are where you leave pens where they can freeze such as in the glovebox of your car or even in a backpack when hiking in the cold.

I wonder if the Polar inks lose their freeze resistance over time. That's what happens with the antifreeze in my car, right?

Could be. I'm sure the bottle sat on the shelf in the store for the better part of a year before I bought it, too. Even so, a total shelf life of two years seems short for an ink. I went ten years on one bottle of Aurora Black. I go through ink a little faster now, but mostly because a penful goes down the sink each time I decide I want to try another ink.

How much would you have to write in order to finish off a 3oz bottle of ink in eight or nine months?

I'd think most of us write through about 2-3 ounces of ink in a year, so I'd think you would need to make it your exclusive ink to finish it off.

I echo your thoughts about the shelf life of ink, and it seems your polar still works as an ink (or did before you froze it). I'm just thinking Nathan probably didn't do any sort of age testing of the Polar ink, mostly because it would take a lot of lead time to do that. He'd have to test the ink for 10 years in order to be able to sell the first bottle of the ink with an assurance it would be freeze resistant for 10 years.

My dad works on the Alaskan oil pipeline. He does indeed sometimes take notes outside (and yes, either wearing big huge mitten or taking it off JUST long enough for the note. You'd be surprised what you can learn to do). Similarly, my company tests some of our products in a "cold room" designed to recreate arctic temperatures, and if you're in there mucking with something, you may need to take notes.

I'm not sure what either person does in this situation right now, as ballpoints are dead by that point, and even pencils have a hard time at that temperature. A fountain pen that doesn't freeze at those temperatures would be ideal.

Hate to make a heretical suggestion, but maybe one of these Rite in the Rain all weather ballpoints? Maybe some kind of cold weather comparison test would be in order while the weather (in some parts of the world) are accommodating.

Doug

Try boiling it first. Put it in a saucepan, bring it to a boil, add a few sauteed onions, simmer nicely, then replace the ink in the bottle and try freezing it. If you add a little thyme, and perhaps just the slightest dash of fresh-ground mace, you'll probably have something interesting.

Not that you should ever put it in a pen after adding all those particles. But we were trying to make ice cream, right? Haagen Dasz brand Polar Noodles, right?

Well off topic, but I would like to suggest antifreeze has three functions, only one of which is obvious:
*Freezing protection
*Anti-corrosion package
*Boil-over protection (it also raises boiling point)
In skimping on the ratio due to modest antifreeze needs, you may be missing something on functions #2 and #3.
I don't know what you drive, but I suspect owner's manual will always recommend a 50/50 mix

The higher the fat content of the ice cream the creamier it will stay despite lower temperatures. Fat doesn't freeze the same way as water, and rich, premium ice cream should have less water than the cheap stuff.

Whatever you do, don't put it in a Yellow Lamy Safari

With a medium nib (Sheaffer) on 7mm ruled paper, approx. 162,000 words (@5 characters/word).

Paddler

While it's true that the higher fat content does create the creamier texture of higher end ice creams... they still will freeze to a brick. My freezer is reading -4 and the Haagan-Daas is rock hard, even Edy's (which has the highest fat percentage of mainstream ice cream, I think) has to be set out for a few minutes to become scoopable. The only thing currently in my freezer that is remotely scoopable is the semi-freddo I made last night and I can't decide if that's fat content (cream and egg yolks) or alcohol (amaretto) that's keeping it softer.

I live in the South so the odds of needing a subzero ink are minimal, but I do find it interesting, and would probably do a freezer test as well, just because y'all have planted the idea in my head

As a side note, anyone adding ethylene glycol or any other deicer to their inks needs to remember NOT to prime their nib in their mouth or leave it around where pets and children might get into it. If we've got any members at Elmendorf or Minot AFBs, perhaps they've already tested FPs and inks.

???? What are people talking about here ??? Wow...... I think its time for me to take a break from the FPN..........

Why do you say that? Quite a few of us here are engineers, some are chemists, and we do this stuff. We tinker with inks, mixes, additives, etc. because pens and inks is not simple cut-and-dried affair. We also test inks for waterproofness and fraud-proof inks for bulletproofness, ponder issues of paper acidity and archival lifetimes, etc., etc. It's all part of the fun.

I don't know much about these polar inks really, except that they flow like rivers even in the driest of pens..

But, are they really guaranteed to be freeze resistant? or does it mean that the ink can freeze, but after thawing (like back in the cabin after the hike through the wilderness and impaling a grizzly in the eye with a frozen FP to escape his clutches) the ink remains identical in usability as prior to?

Perhaps normal inks will not function after a freeze/thaw?

I have no idea. just throwing that up there. But if an ink is rated to NOT freeze at -20F and it does at 32F just like water, then I say we drop the seller into a vat of it and slowly lower the temp until he freezes inside it. Yeah! that's the ticket!

In fact, this seems to be among the more worthwhile threads!

I believe that most inks will withstand being frozen and then thawed and continue to work fine. I think the reason for the Polar inks is a case where you have an FP that you keep in the glovebox of your car, or that's in a backpack exposed to low temperatures, and you want to be able to reach for it and write immediately without unscrewing the barrel and warming the cartridge or converter for a few minutes.

I have not purchased any Polar inks because I have no need for low temperature operation but if those inks flow like crazy, that implies the use of ethylene glycol as an anti-freeze. Ethylene glycol is sometimes added to improve ink flow. Other flow enhancers are glycerine and detergent.

Another plus of an ink that works to -20F is that at that temperature most ballpoints do not function so an FP has the advantage.

Hahaha!

This will undoubtfully be a running gag from now on!

nick

nick1 and menick are not related!

Hey! when I get my BSB, chances are I'll stick it in my white safari! Sorry, I don't have a yellow yet!

What the heck! I'll go and buy a yellow!

Well I do climb mountains, however whilst I have been known to perfrom ice Axe aerobics (don't ask-rarefied air) I have not written in the freezing cold, all my writing has been done in a nice warm hut.

The Boston Globe says Polar Inks are "guaranteed to flow at temperatures down to -110 degrees Fahrenheit"

Pendemonium claims that Nathan Tardiff wrote, "if there is no frost to deal with the ink does not freeze down to -110.2F, though it does thicken slightly after falling to approx. -45F and lower and will have slightly reduced flow at such temperature levels."

So far though, I've yet to see anything directly from Nathan/Noodler's/saying that it's actually guaranteed to be freeze-proof. I've seen several references to the bottle's label saying "freeze-proof to -20F" but I can't find that anywhere on the label of my bottle (which is the Winter 2006 Edition). The label got wet and the lower-right hand corner is blurred. It used to say something there but I can't make it out. It's very possible that the actual performance claims were removed for the "2006 Edition." In which case, from a purely legal point of view, I have no cause to complain. I didn't buy the ink from Pendemonium, so even if they made up what they say is Nathan's writing, they aren't responsible for me buying something from someone else.

(And of course, I'm not saying legalities come into play here and certainly not claiming that Pendemonium made anything up. I'm just talking here.)

But the point is that all my searching has found nowhere where Nathan or Noodler's or Luxury Brands is willing to go on record with any claims about Polar inks being freeze-proof. Only the Pendemonium quote above, and I'm sure that Nathan can't be held accountable for what Pendemonium claims he said.

So am I out of line in beginning to suspect that "Polar" is just a name, and that the formulation may *try* to be freezeproof but that there's no *guarantee* that it won't freeze at +90F?

Of course, I'm not expecting any $1000 reward like if I were able to remove the ink from a check, but I wouldn't mind being permitted to trade it in for a bottle of Heart of Darkness or X-Feather. Or at least a bottle of Polar that doesn't freeze in my fridge.

Heck, I'd settle for being able to send the bottle to Nathan so that he can look and see what happened to try to prevent it from happening in the future, even if I never got a replacement of any sort.

By the way, I think that my freezer must be even warmer than previously thought.

The Häagen Dazs has evaporated.

I suspect that a teenager walked past.
In my experience whenever a teenager walks past a refrigerator, vast quantities of dairy-based products teleport themselves from the 'fridge into the teenager.

Hmm. The only teenager here is my 13-year-old cat Ozzy. I have no doubt he would have loved to get at the ice cream, but I don't think he can reach.

No, the more likely suspect is currently typing a response to a post on Fountain Pen Network. Not naming names or anything.