After taking a dozen pages of notes for my upcoming exam I noticed that the nib of my Pelikan, got smoother and wetter. Upon closer observation of the way the nib flexes (slightly, alhtough I tend to have a heavy hand) while I write there was some noticable misalignament of the tines, the nib has adapted itself to my holding the pen at a slight angle. The change is only minimum and seems to be for the better. The question is, should one adapt to the "right" way of writing with a FP (that is holding it straight) or should the nib be left to "adapt" itself to the writer's grip ?

This is an interesting topic that usually comes about after someone is admonished never to let another person use you fountain pen because the nib will mold to your writing style and if someone else uses it the molding will reoccur and never be a good writer for you.

Of course this doesn't take into account the many thousand of vintage pens that have had several owners and are still excellent writers.


If you are bending the tines of the pen to fit your writing style I say go ahead.



Kurt H

I can understand this happening with a flex nib, but with a nail like a "51" then maybe not. There again a nib that is designed to flex should have enough memory to go back to where it started.

But, what I have seen on well loved pens is a wear pattern on the nib, when looked at under a loupe. After many years of writing there is going to be some mechanical wear/polishing. Having said that, how many pens need tuning and polishing 'out of the box' to get them writing well?

I think that over time a pen will tune itself to your hand, either that or your hand tunes to the pen, (more likely). Therefore I believe that what konstantinos saw was the pen writing in and his hand getting used to the pen.

Jim