Fiberdrunks California Live Oak Iron Gall Ink Recipe Question

[AberHulk]

I am going to start my California Live Oak Iron Gall Ink today. Can this ink be used in fountain pens as well or does it need to be modified? I plan on using cheap Jinhao pens as test subjects. I love to tinker with things so I am excited to make my own ink!

[linearM]

I made iron gal ink using Minnesota oak gals. The recipe I used was 2 oz. ground oak gals, 16 oz. distilled water, 1 oz. iron sulfate, and 1/2 oz. gum arabic. After grinding the oak gals in my coffee grinder (and ruining the grinder) I soaked them in the distilled water. The next day I strained out the ground gals with a tea strainer and then strained the liquid through a coffee filter. I then added the iron sulfate and gum arabic. I am not using the ink in a fountain pen but only with a dip pen. The ink goes down as a medium gray but changes to a warm brown as it dries and oxidizes, usually after several days.

 

I got my iron sulfate from a ceramic supply house (I use it to give color to ceramics in a sawdust firing) and the gum arabic came from an art supply store.

[AberHulk]

I made iron gal ink using Minnesota oak gals. The recipe I used was 2 oz. ground oak gals, 16 oz. distilled water, 1 oz. iron sulfate, and 1/2 oz. gum arabic. After grinding the oak gals in my coffee grinder (and ruining the grinder) I soaked them in the distilled water. The next day I strained out the ground gals with a tea strainer and then strained the liquid through a coffee filter. I then added the iron sulfate and gum arabic. I am not using the ink in a fountain pen but only with a dip pen. The ink goes down as a medium gray but changes to a warm brown as it dries and oxidizes, usually after several days.

 

I got my iron sulfate from a ceramic supply house (I use it to give color to ceramics in a sawdust firing) and the gum arabic came from an art supply store.

Did you only soak for one night?

[linearM]

Yes, just overnight. I suppose you could soak them longer but I got good results. You may want to look for other iron gal recipes, also check on youtube. The recipe I used was based on an old English recipe.

 

It is interesting using a type of ink that was perhaps used by da Vinci, or the renaissance artists to do their drawings. It is a pretty permanent type of ink if you think that drawings and manuscripts created 500 years ago are still studied and appreciated. There were some examples where the ink had actually eaten into the paper, it is acidic, and that is one of the reasons the ink isn't used in fountain pens. However if you get all of the particulate matter strained out and you just fill the pen, use it, and then flush the pen out I would say you might be able to use a fountain pen. But, I wouldn't keep the ink in a pen.

[dcwaites]

There are two types of Iron-Gall ink.

The first is where you ferment the crushed galls, as you want to do. This type is only suitable for dip pens, because you have no real idea of what is in the ink.

The second is where the chemicals are mixed in a laboratory. So long as you get the chemistry right, these are suitable for some fountain pens.

[Plexipens]

Fermentation of the gall nut liquid that allows mold growth actually converts some of the tannic acid into gallic acid. This is a preferred ink in the end, but was developed solely for dip pen usage and predates fountain pens.

 

I've made this ink allowing fermentation for a month and tested it cheaper fountain pens with a convertor only. No destruction of pen parts was noted, but sediment precipitation occurred with clogging requiring cleaning in my ultrasonic.

 

Would probably not risk this ink in a more expensive favorite FP.

[inkstainedruth]

One of the real issues about whether they are "safe" for fountain pens is if the recipe contains gum arabic -- in which case absolutely not safe....

Modern commercial iron gall inks are perfectly safe -- they just take a little more maintenance when flushing. Home recipes? I dunno....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

 

ETA: I mostly use commercial IG inks in c/c pens which are a bit easier to clean. Someone a while back was going to test using something in a vintage Esterbrook for long-term usage, but I don't know what the results were. And -- before anyone asks -- I use those inks in pens with stainless steel nibs all the time. But I do flush a bit more often between fills.

Edited November 13, 2017 by inkstainedruth

[linearM]

I wouldn't use either the iron gal ink or the walnut ink I later made in my fountain pens. They worked great in my dip pens.