Ok I really know nothing so I am in need of major help.

Are classic roller balls blasphemy around here? - If so sorry and please shoo me in the right direction.

Where should someone start to learn about good everyday use pens?

About me: For 5 years or so I have been using some of the wood pens that people make now days. I find that the finish does not seem to last more than a year or two on them. The metal seems to get little spots of corrosion on it. I am looking for a good classic/understated/no gold roller ball to use every day. Why do I say roller ball? Because I am left handed and the ink seemed to dry faster then the fountain pen I have used. This minimizes the smearing as my hand goes over the ink. Maybe I am using bad ink in the fountain pen?


Help me fill my head or send me in the right direction.

Thanks,

Alex

Hi abs,

We're not so much into the ball-thingy pens here but there are plenty of lefties around who will be able to give you advice on real pens (we are slightly biased). Stop around awhile and see how you get on, we may convert you yet...

Hi there and welcome aboard! The above post says practically everthing and since I myself love only real FPs, I can't help you much here but still hang on... sombody else will surely be able to tell you about all of yours needs here...

Mike

The network is mostly about fountain pens, but there are some members who still use ballpoints and rollerballs in everyday life. They'll be able to help you.

Thanks for not running me out of here. And keep it coming


It is not that I have much against fountain pens. In fact I would love some advice from a lefty on how to keep my left hand free of ink with a fountain pen. I was only leaning to rollerball because it seems to work better with my writing style.

I don't use rollerballs myself, but I have seen both brands that come with proprietary refills and others that take standard fountain pen style ink, mostly advertised as cartridges but I suspect some would take converters (refillable from bottled ink) which would give you a wider range of ink choice including faster-drying inks.

From what I've picked up from reading the forum (any errors are due to my misunderstanding and lack of FP experience):

Some inks definitely seem to dry faster than others, but there are a range of variables that can also affect this - amount of ink the pen lays down, the absorbency of the paper, room temperature and humidity, probably others I haven't thought of.

Various ink colours and styles within a brand can apparently also vary enormously, so it's less a case of saying "use such&such a brand and avoid such&such a brand" and more a case of specific brand and colour. For example, some users have reported quick drying for Private Reserve Chocolat but longer drying times for Private Reserve Sherwood Green.
Hopefully some of the left-handed FP users can chime in with recommendations for which are the faster drying inks they use.

Several specifically designed faster drying inks seem to be designed to soak into the paper faster but with the side effects of feathering and bleed-through on more papers.

I'm guessing a finer nib/ball and/or a drier writing pen - i.e. lays down less ink - will probably dry faster.
If you were still considering a fountain pen, you might want to look at fine (F) or maybe extra-fine (XF or EF) or even XXF nibs or needlepoint nibs, but you would have to learn to write with a light touch or they might seem scratchy on many papers.

Some users have recommended adding a little water to the ink (3:1 ink:water or even as little as 8:1 ink:water) to both increase desired ink shading (colour variability from light to dark within your writing) and to decrease drying times.

Good luck!

Regards, Myles.

Miles thanks! That information helps! I do use fine in rollerballs in part because of the drying time. Any suggestions on a fast drying black FP ink that is commonly available would much appreciated. I have one of the new hand made fountain pens that takes the plastic ink cartridges and would like to try it with a faster drying ink. I assume that the pen has a cheap nib(sp?), but I do not really know.

Thanks to all

Oops! Although a finer nib would probably dry faster, I just found this page for left-handed fountain pen users, which states that left-handers probably won't like using fine nibs because many of them use push strokes (which presumably would dig into the paper more with a fine nib, fountain pens being more designed for pull strokes) and would often be better served by a medium nib.

It shows a number of left-handed writing positions which may be of interest.

I don't use black ink myself except occasionally for Noodler's - it isn't an exceptionally fast-drying ink but has compensating qualities (waterproof, fadeproof).

Chris, a leftie, has reviewed Diamine Black as being sufficiently fast drying, so you might want to try that.

I've tried a few Pelikan and Sheaffer inks and found them to be relatively fast drying, but I haven't tried black in either brand, and relatively fast for me may not be fast enough for a left-hander. Hmm, possible support for this in Calling All Lefties and Request for black ink suggestion.

Just having a quick look, I don't think any of the following reviewers has stated their preferred hand:

Girlieg33k has reviewed Lamy Black as relatively fast-drying.

Georges Zaslavsky has reviewed Waterman Black as quick drying, although I've heard some people claim it is more a rather dark grey than a black.

Chuancao has reviewed Visconti Black as rather quick drying.


Regards, Myles.

abs56- are you a leftie overwriter? If so, than you have to worry about ink smearing as you move from left to right on the page you are writing on.
Look a tthe pictures on th e lefthanded writer's pages ( the page Myles linked to). You might want to look at the pictures, and find out how other lefties use their pns so as not to get any of the ink smearing their hands and the paper as they write with their fountain pens.

Hey another lefty from AZ! Hi abs56!

Maybe my experience can help answer some of your questions. First a website: anything left-handed, go there. It's a great resource. They have instructional videos on how to become an underwriter, which will help with the smudging. I'm still an overwriter, and I don't think I'll be making the switch to underwriter, but you may have more willpower than I do in that regard.

Second: Use fine point fountain pens. The finer the better. Unless you're using an italic nib or writing on a paper towel there shouldn't be a problem with the nib digging into the paper. Fine-point pens will put down less ink, less ink means faster drying time, faster drying time means less smudges. Asian pens tend to have finer points than their western counterparts, and Jetpens has some great deals on their site. I personally recommend the Pilot Knight, but I've only dipped into fountain pens myself so it's one of the two pens I own at the moment. So maybe I'm a bit biased there.

For me, roller balls were a gateway pen. I fell in love with how the ink looked and felt on the paper and how smoothly they wrote. And since they have a longer dry time than ballpoints I've adapted to keep my hand out of the ink. So when I tried out a fountain pen I was ready to deal with the dry time. I haven't looked into inks too much because of local availability, but I've had good results with the Pelikan 4001 brilliant black.

Hope that helps!

Thanks I am closest to #6 on Myles linked page. Thanks for all the information this helps!

Myles - thank you for the great replies!

I got some more homework to do.

abs56- I have a friend who used to write like you ( picture #6). he was a PhD student at the Univ of Michigan,and wanted to use his pens to d a lot of academic writing, so he practised a bit,and was able to change his leftie writing style to the style depicted on picture #1. It took a while, but after about a month's worth of consciously writing in the new style, it became natural to him, and now he can write efficiently with a fountain pen.

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