Monteverde Inks With Rotten Egg Smell

[sharonspens]

Thanks for this info. I checked my two bottles (motivation orange and hope green) and both are actually fine. The orange has no scent, and the green just has a bit of a scent, not unpleasant - just a scent.

 

Sharon in Indiana

[dragorsi]

Just checked my bottles and oh boy, the smell :/

Thanks for the update!

[MsRedpen]

Good news

All 5 bottles are fine! 2 x Rose Noir, Ocean Noir, Copper Noir and Moonstone.

All bought from European vendors in April 2018.

[uceroy]

I've just received my free replacement bottle from MV 🙂 Very pleased with the customer service, and I won't hesitate to buy more of their inks

[Mangione]

Thank you for the heads up. My bottle of Fireopal has a bad odor, and I currently have a pen inked up with it (Lamy Safari with converter). Should I flush and clean the pen with alcohol?

[ErrantSmudge]

Alcohol can permanently damage some parts of a pen, including plastics and especially acrylics. Perhaps someone has done this with their Safari unscathed, but I would be careful.

 

My Lamy Studio had spoiled Copper Noir in it. I flushed the pen with a solution of Dawn Antibacterial dish detergent in water. Some people suggest flushing with a mild dilute solution of bleach to ensure the infection is cleared.

 

I took an extra step; I mixed up a special ink. I have a pourout vial with a mix of various blues. I added a drop of phenol to this mix and loaded my pen with "Phenol Blue".

Edited March 30, 2019 by ErrantSmudge

[Carrau]

Like uceroy several posts earlier, I received my replacement ink from Monteverde today, about a week after notifying them of my bottle of ink turned bad. I have to echo uceroy’s pleasure with their customer service. They responded to my initial query within an hour, no questions asked, and replaced it within a week. I’ve been happy with their inks, and now with CS. Thanks Monteverde/Yafa.

[ErrantSmudge]

My replacement bottles of ink arrived today, also about a week after I contacted Monteverde. They also accepted my request to replace my spoiled bottle of Fire Opal with Copper Noir, as I like Copper Noir a bit better.

 

They've definitely made things right in my book.

[ScarletWoodland]

Thankfully mine are all fine (capri blue, horizon blue, california teal, copper noir, valentine red) but it's great to hear they're responding to the issues so well.

Dammit, my newer Olivine is definitely not fine. Too late to contact them do you think?

[Carrau]

I would write them: you have nothing to lose. I would try to give them an idea of when you purchased the ink and from whom so they may be able to determine when it was manufactured.

[ScarletWoodland]

I would write them: you have nothing to lose. I would try to give them an idea of when you purchased the ink and from whom so they may be able to determine when it was manufactured.

I sent them a little email, acknowledging that we all have more to worry about than ink at the moment so no pressure. They're probably working from home in their pyjamas and not inclined to run to a post office any time soon.

Edited March 31, 2020 by ScarletWoodland

[awa54]

My bottle of olivine is smelly, though hadn't caused any problems so far... on the theory that I don't want to get a rampant SITB infection going in my ink collection, I cleaned out the only pen I had used it in with dillute vinegar solution and promptly re-inked it with Diamine Registrar's, that ought to kill whatever might be left in there!

[kestrel]

I checked my previously unopened 90 mL bottle of Horizon Blue last Sunday and it smelled like hydrogen sulfide. I emailed Scott at Yafa on March 31 and he replied within an hour:

 

"Thank you for contacting Yafa Brands. Due to the Covid-19 stay at home order in effect for Los Angeles, our offices are temporarily closed until April 30th. We are endeavoring to answer questions remotely the best we can, and thank you for your patience as there may be some matters that we will have to handle when we return."

I shall be patient. Very patient.

[ScarletWoodland]

I'm trying to still be patient as realistically they're probably completely different wings of the company. That said, I do find it kind of irritating to see Monteverde constantly posting to instagram, when all those of us with faulty bottles have received is an autoreply and then silence.

[ScarletWoodland]

I figured my email had gotten buried as their customer service is usually so good. Decided to reply to their initial auto-reply today, just reminding them that I was still waiting on a response. They emailed me back within half an hour to ask for my address to send a replacement 👍.

 

If anyone else is waiting too, just shoot them another email and they'll sort you out 🙂.

[kestrel]

I figured my email had gotten buried as their customer service is usually so good. Decided to reply to their initial auto-reply today, just reminding them that I was still waiting on a response. They emailed me back within half an hour to ask for my address to send a replacement .

 

If anyone else is waiting too, just shoot them another email and they'll sort you out .

Same thing here. They were inundated with emails and are slowly working through the mess. Good thing. I only have two fills left on my smaller, good bottle.

[TSherbs]

As an inkmaker, how do you screw up something as fundamental as resistance to rot? This is one of the most basic requirements.

[Patrick L]

" Here's a message from Yair Greenberg, the founder/CEO of Yafa who bottles the Monteverde ink."

 

Thanks for the info. But who actually manufactures Monteverde ink ?

[sansenri]

As an inkmaker, how do you screw up something as fundamental as resistance to rot? This is one of the most basic requirements.

I think you are right, but there are two factors that impact industrial production, one is industrial scale, it's much more difficult tracing a source of contamination in a larger scale plant. The other is use of antimicrobials which is now very severely regulated by authorities. This has led to a reduction of these ingredients (for safety reasons) to the verge of inefficacy... or at least lower resistance to contamination than before.

 

Would be nice to have a source of antimicrobial, such as phenol, but difficult to buy.

Edited June 16, 2020 by sansenri

[XYZZY]

As an inkmaker, how do you screw up something as fundamental as resistance to rot? This is one of the most basic requirements.

 

That's my initial reaction as well, but then I remember a very informative post written by a GM from Herbin in 2012 when Herbin had a recurring problem with their inks (which is now ancient history). The Monteverde problem is of course different inks and none of the information in this post necessarily applies. But still informative, and a reminder that intelligent experienced people are still subject to mistakes. As much as I like reading about inks, this might actually be my favorite Inky Thought:

 

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/213803-update-on-j-herbin-ink-problems/