Not accusing anyone or anything, but after I started using FPN Tulipe Noire in my Lamy 2000, the pen started to give off an odour.

The odour's concentrated around the nib sections and inside the caps, so I think it's the ink.

On some days it's quite strong, and I catch whiffs of it while writing.

Let me try to describe it: sorta like how FPN Tulipe Noire smells in the bottle, mixed with perspiration.

I write high up the barrel, and never touch the section so I don't think my sweat has anything to do with it.

Am concerned as my Pelikan 250 seems to have a similar odour around the nib. I filled it with Tulipe Noire twice previously.

Has anyone else discovered this too?

I'm really hoping it's not mold!

I think you're smelling the HR of the feeds, rather than the ink.

Just to make sure I did smell the DTN, and it smells slightly, but of grated sour apple, specifically, "goudreinette". I don't know what the apple's name in English is, but there are two varieties, one used for the best (and most expensive) apple sauce, which is the green variety, and the red variety, which is seen as a hand apple.

Anyway, HR does smell a little, it is an unstable substance over time, and releases sulphur and sulphur holding chemicals from the molecular bonds which make it hard rather than soft rubber. Do note that the human nose is very sensitive to this stuff: we can smell it at 1 ppm and less.

BTW, smelling that DTN from the bottle was a pleasant surprise .

I think we need to add something to the ink reviews from now on: smell .

HTH, warm regards, Wim

I have not had any odor issues with my bottles of Tulipe Noire. In the bottle, the ink has a slight perfume-like character that really is like apples, though I would have been hard put to identify it without the above comment. I cannot myself imagine what you are smelling.

Thanks for the comments so far. I think I can live with the smell... I like the inks too much anyway.



Thanks, but umm... do Pelikan and Lamy still make their feeds out of hard rubber? I thought they switched to plastic ages ago?

I don't know. Lemme check...

Ok, M200s, both smelly, one more than the other. M800, clearly smelly. Not ink, HR, and plastic, or rather solvents.

I don't have any Lamys with me currently, on this trip, so I can only check that during the weekend.

Plain old plastic doesn't work very well in fountain pens for feeds, AFAIK. Quite a few pens use nylon feeds. These have similar characteristics to HR ones. Examples are the Stipulas. Certainly the Etrurias come with nylon feeds.

Anyway, I dd smell quite a few more pens, of which I know they have nylon feeds , and these pens generally smell of the (main) material they were made off, which clearly is (much) more pungent that the ink in that pen. IOW, acrylic, resin, and celluloid smell quite a bit stronger than any of the inks they carry. I have DTN in my Etruria Nuda, and the smell of that pen is slightly overpowering, to me anyway, as in, acrylic.

The only inks I do get a little whiff from in the pen, when sniffed from very nearby, are FPN GMB in my Stipula Iris, which is slightly musty, but not very strong, and Noodler's Socrates in my 1911, also musty, but a different kind. In both cases I can also smell the pen material itself, and in both cases that smell is slightly stronger, but not much, than the ink smell itself.

I just realised that you also reported a smell from the cap. That is an indication for sure of outgassing solvents used to make the material of the cap of that pen, not of the ink. Because the cap is on the pen most of the time, with a fair amount of hollow space, it is an ideal place to hold those gases for longer than the outside of the pen. And for some reason, probably because it is a relatively humid place, the smell is often stronger in the cap than, f.e., in the barrel at least in my experience.

HTH, warm regards, Wim

You've had me ink-sniffing!

DTN....as wim says, Bramley apples, with that slightly sharp, appley perfume....no smell in my Targa
Aurora Black....a hint of vanilla?
Diamines, various....none, or just slightly musty
J Herbin Reseda... a whiff of sweaty socks!
JH Cyclamen...flowery
JH Myosotis...nothing immediately identifiable!

• Noodler's Polar Black : white carpenter's glue
• Aurora Black : I agree with rogerb, vanilla extract.
• N. Blue Ghost : just like the Aurora Black (vanilla). A lot of benzaldehyde derivatives have similar bouquet. I have no idea if Blue Ghost contains any benzaldehyde derivative.
• PR Midnight Blues : Intensely blueberry jelly.
• N. FPN Galileo Manuscript Brown : dirty laundry water
• N. Baystate Blue : not much different than A. Black and N. Blue Ghost, but an untoward discovery in the process of procuring a sniff: it stains clearcoat instantly and very deeply, so beware your desk and hardwood floors. I'm not sure what type of varnish/clearcoat this is. It's an Ikea desk bought second-hand (you may wonder with me what I'm doing buying all these inks if this is the only desk I can afford...), and was coated by the previous owner, probably something polyurethane.

Now I'm going to have to sniff my inks...

Does... Solvent Abuse.. mean anything to you?
Actively encouraging it just seems wrong, now....pass the bottle.

Ring around the nose! Ring around the nose! So embarassing!

You can tell a bee by its painful sting,
You can tell a bell by its crystal ping,
And you can tell a sniffer by his inky ring,
but not much.

Sign in a Pen Shop window- Help wanted, Blue noses need not apply!

My sniffer has gotten too sensitive - all inks smell to me these days. Noodler's and PR the most - but they all smell.

I know that's totally useless to you but I had to say it. Just 'cause.

Has anyone considered designing an aroma wheel (like for wine tasting) for ink?