I’ve noticed there were no reviews on the Retro 51 Tornado and I decided to do a brief one.

I got this pen today from isellpens.com (no aff.) and right off the fedex box I can tell you I like the presentation packaging from the maker (see the picture).

Description of the pen.
Black, I think it’s lacquer over metal body, stainless steel trim. Matte finish section (acrylic, I think). Medium weight. Screw on cap.

Nib.
Two tone steel. Reads: Retro (vertically writing), M.


Pros
Nice weight. The matte finish section is very comfortable. The cap secures tightly when screwed on (the section). The nib is buttery smooth!!! The clip is easy to attach to your shirt pocket (dress shirt) and/or inside pocket of your dress coat/suit.

Cons.
Cap won’t post securely on the barrel of the pen, and this particular pen, without the cap posted, feels too light in my hand when i write.

As you can see it has a lot more pros than cons. The best part of the pen is the nib. Lays down a wet medium line (I’m using PR midnight blues) and it’s very smooth. I can compare it to my Parker Frontier, which is the smoothest of the steel nib pens I own. And of course, the price! I paid $34 USD, shipping included.

I recommend the pen to anyone who’d like to get a great writer without spending a lot of dough.

Ciao for now.

(Picture taken from the isellpen.com site)

PS. edited, to better explain the posting of the cap!!!

Pros
Nice weight. The matte finish section is very comfortable. The cap secures tightly when screwed on. The nib is buttery smooth!!! The clip is easy to attach to your shirt pocket (dress shirt) and/or inside pocket of your dress coat/suit.

Cons.
Cap won’t post securely and this particular pen, without the cap posted, feels too light in my hand.
================

These 2 statements seem contradictory to me; would you please elaborate about the cap? Does it loosen after screwing it on?

Thanks!


diane

i see why. sorry, i was tired at 1am when i wrote this!! the cap screws fine on the section. when one tryes to post it on the barrel to write, it does not!!! that's why my comment about being too "light", i meant when i'm writing without the cap posted on the barrel!!!!!

this pen screws on to the section but not to the end of the barrel!!

Hi Peter,
Thanks for the review! I have two Retro 51 Tornado fountain pens and both of them post (cap on back of barrel) securely. I only have one inked right now (a "Cognac" one I bought at Silberman Brown in Seattle last month for 20% off ) but I can see that it definitely has some kind of inner cap liner that helps to hold the barrel in place. Does your cap have one, too? It might be hard to see with a black cap, but if you shine a flashlight down there, you can probably see down the cap....

The pens I have both have super nibs. I got the first one (in "Curacao") from fellow FPNer Apollo a few years ago and I fell in love with the nib (and pen) right away but had trouble finding one on eBay for a good price. None of the stores around here sell the Tornado fountain pen...only the rollerballs (which are excellent capless rollerballs, I might add) so I was pleased to find another one in Seattle in a pattern I was seeking

hi maja, thanx for the info. yes, it does have a inner cap, yet, it does not post very well. maybe i should e-mail todd at isellpens and switch it for one that does... although i feel that's the reason he had them at close out prices!!!!

it's good to know they post well!!! i can live with mine as it is though.

i do agree about the super nibs!!!!
reagards,

Oh, I love the Retro 51 Tornado Model, particularly their very creative LEs.
I have the Cioppino (seashell), the Postmaster, and the Cherry Blossoms!
http://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/in...showtopic=63694



Enjoy yours!
QM2

Are you using the pen with the included cartridges or with a converter? When I spoke to Todd he told me he didn't have a converter to fit the pen. Did you have any luck finding one?

They fit mini-converters; I think both the plunger and squeeze type.

Oh man. I just got my order from Todd today (got the pilot instead). Should have gotten the Tornado. Than again, I love my little pilot now!

i wanna get one of those. enjoy it.

very nice. i'm seeing that i lot more people than i thought like this tornados

The 78g is a very odd pen. I'm happy in a way that I got it over the tornado because it allowed me to try a couple other Chinese pens. The F nib on the pilot has to be the finest F I've ever seen. More like an EF or even smaller. I use it daily to write up chemical reactions.

i'm glad you like your pen. i'm aiming to getting one myself. but, i thought the pilot was japanese, not chinese???!!!

Pilot is a Japanese company, and the 78G is made there [as far as I know].

As the owner of a couple Tornado's I can say the style is nice and they post fine. The problem I have noticed is ink drying out too quickly. Within a 90 seconds (yes, I timed it) of not writing the nib bneeds to be dipped in water to start. Even with PR Tanzanite.

ook!... i did the test with mine: 90 sec and wrote down a nice wet line when i put down to the paper (i didn't wanna go for another test)

still doesn't post very well. i went to Flax in san francisco and checked out a few tornados they had on dispaly and noticed that some post and some don't... interesting!!!

On my close out page at: isellpens.com I have extra nibs for these pens for $12.00.

These are extra nib units I had purchased to give more options when selling the Retro 51 line of pens. You simply un screw these nibs to replace in a pen. You can uses these in Retro 51, Bexley and Romet brands of pens just to name a few. These nibs are made by Schmidt for Retro 51. So, they do say Retro 51 on the nib. However, personally it would not bother me to use them in a different maker's pen. They are a two toned nib.

Any idea who sells them?

man, i'm disappointed. i checked a mini-converter i got from isellpens a while back and even though it should be like the intl. carts, it does not fit the retro 51!!!

edit a PS: that is, it fits in length but not the mouth.

That seems to be the problem. I came dashing in to work this morning as I knew I had a very small 'european' converter in my desk from one of those cheap 'French' mini-pens I bought last year, but like yours, its OK lengthwise, but the mouth of it doesn't fit. It also seems to me that bog-standard euro cartridges don't fit very well either. At the moment, the ink flow I'm getting is very poor, but that could be becaaue the cartridge I'm using was one from the back of my desk drawer and could have been there for years...... I have one other 'fix' to try that worked on a short-barrelled Rotring Lissabon last year, but I need to nip out at lunchtime to try that......

I couldn;t try the 'fix' today after all as I couldn't pick up the cheapo caligraphy set from Rymans in which there is a very small converter which I used on the Lissabon.

In fact, I'd really like to hear from anyone who has got a converter to fit this pen. I've tried 4 converters this afternoon from pens which take an ordinary euro cartridge - Baoer, Huashilai and a couple were in my desk drawer and I can't get any of them to fit the Retro 51 - irrespective of the internal barrel length, they just won't fit on the nib section..... I can't resign myself to using cartirdges again.......

According to an email from Retro 51: Also in reference to the Tornado Fountain pens, they are designed to only hold the standard international cartridges, not converters.