Sailor Young Somiko M Review

[vig2432]

One of my newest accquistions is the Sailor Young Somiko Fountain pen in M nib. This is my first Sailor pen. I had bought it from pensindia.com, a subsidary of the famous engeika.com which provided japanese writing instruments. The service was quick and I was happy with Mr. Raul from pensindia who handles my correspondence promptly. All I can say is I am happy with their product and I will patronise them in the future (Disclaimer: No relation to pensindia.com or engeika.com)

 

PACKAGING

 

The pen comes in a small cardboard pack which houses a plastic pen case.

The case contains the pen itself, a Sailor converter and two sailor catridges of black ink.

 

 

 

The packaging is nothing to talk home about. It just does its job to deliver the pen.

 

DESIGN

 

The pen is a very sleek and minimalistic. The pen is made of black plastic with gold trims. Near the section, it says "SAILOR". It has a black finial surrounded by a gold ring on top. The clip is very stiff, but one can use with some care. The pen is very light and the balance feels good on this pen. It has a fairly long section and comfortable to write with for long times. One caveat is that since the plastic is very glossy, it picks up oils stains if one has sweaty hands.

 

 

NIB

 

The nib is a M nib. The somiko comes with a gold plated steel nib. Suprisingly, the Sailor M nib lays a line a touch wider than my Pilot Tank NOS M pen. There is a hint of feedback with the nib and it has a small sweet spot. I have to work on the nib as the horizontal strokes encounter more resistance than the vertical strokes. I got a standard Sailor converter (comparable to a CON 50 converter) which hold s upto 1-1.2 ml of ink. Since, it is a gold plated nib, the nib has some springiness to it and you can coax some line variation out of it, but I would'nt recommend it. The pen cannot be converted to an ED as it has metal threads in the section joining the barrel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Picture (left to right : Pilot metroploitan M, Sailor young Somiko M, Pilot Celemo 14K M)

 

CONCLUSION

 

This is a no nonsense pen which can be used for everyday carry. Since , it holds a good capacity of ink it can be used for long writing sessions. I bought this pen for INR 3000(~USD 48) which I think is an excellent value for money considering that it comes out with a converter. I would recommend this pen to a beginner.

Edited February 18, 2015 by vig2432

[sannidh]

nicely reviewed!

How did you find the somiko in terms of nib smoothness ?

 

Best,

Sonik

[vig2432]

nicely reviewed!

How did you find the somiko in terms of nib smoothness ?

 

Best,

Sonik

I would say it is fairly smooth, with a hint of feedback. But if i were to compare with say, a pilot celemo(same price range), i would rate the pilot nib to be more smoother IMHO

[hari317]

Thanks for the review.

 

Personally, at this price point, I would choose the Celemo.

[vig2432]

Thanks for the review.

 

Personally, at this price point, I would choose the Celemo.

yes true with an additional bonus of a 14K gold nib

[a_m]

Nice review.

 

But that guy's name is Rahul

[vig2432]

Nice review.

 

But that guy's name is Rahul

 

but he signs his name as raul