Well I know I shouldn't have but I was very pleased with my first Pelikan that I got only a week ago. So I bought another Pelikan (M400).

Though this is a beautiful pen, I am a bit stunned on the overall packaging and presentation. My Pelikan Shanghai came in a more plush and beautiful box than this M400. The M400 box was nothing more than obvious thick cardboard taped together. Some of the sides were not even taped well. I know just a box, the pen is fine, but still kind of unsettling. I wonder if maybe this was a return, maybe.

Hmm... so familiar... Where have I seen this pen before?

i'm confused - is the white tortoise you're showing the second pen and the box in the pic is the box it came in? i'd say that's more than "cardboard".

pelikan did change to a blue presentation box recently and it is a little more attractive. but not much different from the black and yellow in terms of construction that I can tell.

what was your first Pel? I ask because the cities/places pens come in a much fancier box. My Piazza Navona box is so beautiful that I'm still trying to find some way to make use of it in a display. Gorgeous chocolate brown suede. Much too large for a single pen. I'd guess that's more typical of the limited series pens and partly why we pay a bit more for them (usually.) The 400s and 200s don't warrant such fluff 'cause they're just good utility pens.

oh... great choice btb.

Yes, my first Pelikan was a cities (Shanghai). That was a gorgeous pen from every aspect.
I mean it's certainly not just cardboard, but you can definitely tell the difference. I mean on my box the paper cover was falling off because it wasn't taped securely (Picture below). It's just a box really, but I am just shocked that Pelikan would neglect something like this.

Also I noticed the Pelikan logo on this M400 (on the cap) is different (compared to that of my cities pen, which looks like my avatar's logo). Why is that?

And, is it just me, does the nib on the M400 seem more wet compared to your cities Pelikan?

my white tortoise and PN are about the same in terms of flow. maybe the torty was a bit wetter but not a lot. The PN nib is 18K and I would have expected it to be a bit springier and therefore have more flow - but it is just a medium flow as are most of my pels.

the logo changed er.. last year or the year before and I'm sure there are still a number of caps out there that had the previous logo (two chicks instead of one) on them.

personally, i wish they'd all go back to the engraved logo instead of the screened logo. But it's not my decision.

consider the price difference though between a 200/400 and 600 and above. It's significant. For such "inexpensive pens" (by comparison, the 400s are a pretty good deal for a 14K nib, especially the white tortoise which seems to not sell as well as they'd hoped) why "waste" a high quality box? If I were doing the marketing, I'd go with the standard box too. Most of what we pay for with the cities pens is the hype anyway. Part that hype is a classier box.

What color was the Shanghai box? The brown suede of the PN box suited the pen but I don't know if that's just the standard cities/places box or if they vary it from design to design.

For my M600, I was offered the choice of a basic box or a gift box when ordering. The gift box would cost an additional 90 kronor (very roughly 10 euros or 12 US dollars) so I settled for the basic box. This turned out to be a very simple box of thin cardboard, just big enough to hold the pen, just like the one my M200 came in. In both cases, the person who handed me the pen in the store said something along the lines of "you'd think they'd give you a nicer box with a pen this expensive...!".

Yep it's matching colors, my Shanghai box was red (http://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/up...-1143757716.jpg)

Ha, is that what it is? Two chicks? I couldn't even tell, it looked more like two dangling pair of socks. (http://www.penhero.com/PenGallery/Pelikan/...ikan1000_02.jpg)

My M400 seems to be wetter leaving highlights (is that the right term?) in my writing while my Shanghai is even throughout. I'm sure some people probably prefer the former, but I don't. I'm going to see if I can get the nib exchanged.

everyone is different on that (see Glenn-SC's thread in Writing Instruments re: how you like your flow) and for me it's dependent on the pen and the ink. I want Levenger Cobalt to be a solid, unvarying color. I want Squeteague and Emerald to show their full beauty in a varying swath.

you can, of course, exchange the nib. There is a thread in Repair Q&A on decreasing flow so you might want to check that out first.

can't see your images directly but I'll copy and paste into my browser. (ignore that, now it works)

IMO, i still prefer the earlier logos. and would have preferred they kept two chicks as this is, depending on the Pelikan (white or brown) more accurate.

Are these cracks in the pen cap?? I see two seperate lines in the white area between the gold band. Sorry not sure the correct term for these parts. And I can't really take a picture of it because my consumer digital camera doesn't have a macro feature.

At first I noticed it, but thought it was probably something intentional. Just now I looked inside the cap where these 'cracks' are and it indeed does look like a crack.

So am I right? If so, I'm disgusted at the store where I bought this pen from, with the box ripped, and the pen cap cracked.

hi.. again.

well, somewhere there is a thread about this issue. I can't find it and don't know why. I can't remember if it was in Repair Q&A or Writing Instruments but I'll keep looking.

Short story - contact Pelikan. They are not cracks unless they split past the cap ring further up the cap. HOWEVER, there is that risk. This is probably an older Honey as this problem was mostly (not entirely) seen in the first runs of manufacture. I am not fully aware of the manufacturing process but there are four "seams" on all Pelikan caps that have 1.5 or 2 cap bands. But for some reason the white plastic had problems with properly sealing these seams. I sent back a couple of caps but the cap I have now has not had any problems. Some have accepted them as cosmetic as they often don't show until dirt or ink has gotten into them. But on one of my caps the seam and progressed into a crack about 1/3" long or so and that was disturbing.

I do love my Honey and it is a stunning pen. And I'd never get rid of it and I still recommend it to people. But this was a problem they had - I guess I assumed that since I have a good cap, the problem had been solved or at least the bad caps were out of the market. Silly assumption i suppose.

I'll keep searching for that thread. and add it to this post if I find it.
kcat

Thanks, I never knew about that.

I agree with you on the pen being beautiful, probably one of the better looking 100$ pens I've seen around. But with the issues pointed out, I'm just displeased by the whole purchase experience. Especially the condition the store sent it to me in. I don't care if I can exchange it, they should've never sold it to me like this. I am going to return it. Probably one day, I'll purchase it again, but definitely from somewhere else.

I miss the yellow and black cardboard boxes. To me that made a lot of sense, because I would rather have the pen company spend on the pen not the box.

Bill

And i think that's probably wise - they need to know, if diplomatically, that they need to be more mindful of their stock. It's a shame because with one interesting exception, i've never had anything but excellent materials (not just Pelikan) from stores - on-line or brick&mortar. And the one exception I was able to get past because, thank goodness, my pen got from Europe to the US in a bubble pack and a thin (we're talking really minimal) little box barely better than a Hero box (and if you've seen those, you know what I mean) without any damage.

meanwhile - don't be burned on Pelikan in general - they make some great pens.