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Review Of Old Style Two-Chick Ob And Obb Nibs


LyaT

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LayT, some day you need to become adventuresome, and get a nice two toned shading ink. :notworthy1: :thumbup: Pelikan 4001, MB, Heribin and R&K..................you do need 90g or better paper to have the inks shade, outside the Rhodia 80g and some Japanese 70g. (I was late to the party with Rhodia, and got the new 90g instead of the regular 80g.)

I also had some good to better paper, in I did not find Rhodia or the Clarefontaine Triomphe 90g, to be overly slick...........I do notice it somewhat slick with butter smooth nibs. but not as slick as the reputation says. Most of my pens are good and smooth.....a slight tad of paper feel.

 

Toothy is like writing with a pencil.....those who like toothy, can talk of which #1, #3 or other pencil hardness they relate their nib and paper too. B) (Actually they don't...or not that I've stumbled on.) One does eventually need a toothy nib, so one can play with super wet inks.....or other dryer inks to see how a paper feels at it's 'max.'

I don't quite get into it that heavy.....but fountain pens is a land of extremes.

 

I grew up before butter smooth became IN........it's easier to make fat bloggy nibs butter smooth.

One of the reasons I like the 'new' 200's I have, they are good and smooth, the level under butter smooth. The same as my 400 and other Pelikan 90's pens.

 

My butter smooth 605 BB was swapped from a real nice M to wider BB in sooner or Later and it was much later I was either going to stub or CI it. I stubbed it to B or 1.0. It did have the baby bottom from over polishing, in many want butter smooth at all costs. Baby bottom is not common on the thinner pre'98 nibs, nor the 200's.

 

Shading takes a much better paper and ink match for semi-flex '50-65 era Pelikans due to ease of tine spread semi-flex is a wetter nib. It can be done, but is more work to find.

(other German companies like Geha made semi-flex to '70 or 72. I'm not sure when MB stopped making semi-flex. I think when the 146 grew in size. I have a '70's-80's Large 146 that has a regular flex nib. My '50-60's medium-large 146 has a real nice maxi-semi-flex nib.)

 

 

Many newer posters call two toned inks, 'wishy-washy' or pastel...........wanting a real wet line.

Well, I find vivid monotone supersaturated inks rather boring.............. :P

Do lay hands on some 4001 Blue Black, one of the great inks, and it shades, on good to better paper. (It is illegal in the States, and has to be smuggled in, in small mailed packages.....they didn't use strong Norway Rats in the tests, so do not drink much of the ink. Pelikan 4001 inks shade on good 90g paper, ans is still cheap.

Pelikan designed it's nib and feed to that dry ink, which is why Pelikan is so wet with wet inks.

 

Oxford Optic 90g is a nice affordable paper. It is also used in the Red&Black notebooks. Clairefontaine Velout` 90g is exactly = to the Oxoford. I have both in spiral notebooks. Will buy again.

 

Your wide nibs will do well with sheen inks....but there I'm way behind, and don't know my A from my Elbow. Again good paper will be needed.

 

Writing is 1/3 nib width/flex, 1/3 paper and 1/3 ink, and in that order.

(Some folks add 1/3 user too.)

Do spend some time over in the paper section finding out what is the better papers you can get in Ireland.

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

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Ah Adventuresome! So far, getting the OBB nib is the most adventurous trial. Worked out really well.

 

Thanks Bo Bo for your advice. I practiced your trick of holding an oblique for a couple of days. Now I could find the angle more naturally.

 

I have Rhodia 90g in ivory color. I dont like it. I much prefer Japanese paper. I was highly impressed by the 013 refill in my travellers notebook. I bought Tomoe River 52g and 68g, the 52g is very similar (maybe the same) as 013 refill. I also have Midori MD. I found Japanese paper very good with shading, even with my super wet nibs.

 

The red and black notebooks sound nice. Just checked on Amazon, the price is very reasonable! Much more reasonable than Japanese paper. I will give it a try. I take a lot of meeting notes and research notes at work. The red and black might suit very well.

 

Ah the inks. I have a small collection only. I have a bottle of 4001 royal blue, came with my M101n, never tried it yet. Will put it in my next fill. I have a Montblanc Swan Illusion coming my way, from what I read, it is a good shading ink.

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Paper is tricky. There are tons of awful and essentially unusable papers (for fountain pens) around. Then there are a very few makers, Japanese or French, you get recommended all the time on FPN. Most of them are rather expensive (at least here) with the exception of Oxford. But my problem with these recommendations is that the selection is so narrow. I'm always looking for more variety and smaller, lesser known producers. France still has a good number of excellent small paper mills and so does Italy. Some are found in Spain. I'm not sure about the UK but I'd suspect that some of them survived but I couldn't name an example right now. In Germany, most went belly up in the past few years. So, if you want to leave the beaten tracks you have to search and sample a lot. I'm sometimes surprised and very happy what good paper can be found for a decent price and different from the few standard papers.

 

Ink is a totally different story. Now there is an insanely huge selection of high quality inks around. You could buy yourself silly. Somehow it seems to me that it became hip to buy fancy, expensive inks. Don't know why because I'm more than happy with what Waterman, Pelikan (4001), and Diamine (and a few more) offer for very reasonable prices. You seem to live in Ireland and so I'd suspect that Diamine might be more or less available, especially in Dublin. They make some very good inks woth seeking out. One of my favourites is Monaco Red.

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Em, I also felt the same thing about paper reviews. There are a few dominating brands with lots of fans. Years ago, I bought a notebook from a special paper shop in Florence, IL PAPIRO. That time I wasnt into fountain pens. I wrote a few pages with a dip pen I bought in that same shop, since then the notebook has been sitting on my bookshelf. Recently I tried out the paper with my fountain pens. The paper is really high quality. Ink does not spread on this paper, so the lines look thinner than on tomoe river paper.

 

Here is a sample. The paper has the shop logo printed on every page. Very elegant looking. The notebook isnt cheap though. I cant remember the price now, but when I bought it I was shocked at the price so I only bought one book.

post-150706-0-14048700-1560070489_thumb.jpeg

post-150706-0-45365400-1560070503_thumb.jpeg

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I am horrible at taking pictures, the phone camera doesnt do justice.

 

My old style OB nib writes only slightly thicker, if at all, compared with modern M400 M nib without any custom grinding.

 

The old style OBB is noticeably thicker.

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Watermarks use to be on good papers, was a way back in the day to know the paper was good....the company was bragging.

M&K makes good papers, right now I only have the typewriter paper....which is sized like all typewriter paper on one side only. It is 95 g. The other two are also good....or I'd not run through them.

Do avoid like the plague the rest of the papers made by Brunner.

I went paper hunting in Heidelberg some 5 or so years ago, and found Brunner papers that should have been good. Including a 120g deckle effect paper.......that is the rounded uneven sides...it too ended up in my laser printer.

Rostler ? same....oh, the 120g was so sinfully nice to write on, it would be illegal to use on a Sunday in Kansas...............but feathered big time. Luckily I was buying single sheets.of a couple Rossler or 5-10 sheets only in it was expensive. The cheaper pad, also feathered.

 

 

Conqueror is an English paper that was fairly good..........but not quite great..........but there are more versions, perhaps you could luck out. Do look it up in the Paper Review sections.

 

I was disappointed in Clairalfa 120g, by Clairefontaine; it hasn't ended up in the printer .... yet.

 

6-7 years ago, Aldi had some great papers for back to school sales. I didn't expect much in it was well affordable and from Aldi. I bought Hammered, Laid,marbled at 90 g. The Marbled really surprised me. Linnen Effect 120 g was the other. The next year they had it again, and I've been living off that selection ever since.

Sadly Aldi didn't do it a third year, in I was going to buy enough to feed a number of nice posters.

 

But with out the Aldi kick in the rear, of affordable, I'd still be futzing around, instead of having Hammered, marbled, laid and linen effect, as a starter.

I do have some G.Lolo Verge de France.....a laid paper, but have it in heavy, 160g instead of the normal 90g.

 

I have laid and linen effect Southworth papers I bought in the States......but they are combo papers....as good as they are, I will always wonder how good they could have been had they not also been Laser & InkJet. Ink Jet must absorb Ink Jet ink very fast....and pure Ink Jet paper feathers heavy with fountain pen inks.

If possible get pure laser....not a compromise paper.

 

If you want samples of a paper company that makes art paper too, make sure you ask for the fountain pen friendly papers.One nice company sent me a selection of their art papers which are useless for fountain pens.

With Gmund I asked, and was given a list. I got two free sheets and paid E0.85 for each of the other 10 papers...90g to 170. At the price of E40 for either 100 or just 50 depending on which paper. I dithered for years.

That allowed me to test years worth of inks and pens.........I got second best, a hundred sheets of the 170g 'Blanc Beige' the style of making, creme. I like the feel of heavy paper, in the 120g of the same was perfect. Some day I'll get the best.

The 150g was pretty good too.

At that price it did take me some 5-6 years worth of testing and dithering before I bought it. Was it worth it. Yes.

The Original Gmund at E40 for 50 wasn't as good.

 

If you can find old paper on the Ebay buy it. The Golden Age of Papers died in the 70-80's and I was a Ball Point Barbarian so didn't notice. :crybaby:

I had some '70's Zander's BankPost/bond paper (that was too good for my Juki Daisy wheel printer) that is a slight tad better than modern....

 

Elco? I think the Swiss paper is, has a good rep. An elderly woman I know gave me some envelopes from that paper. Sooner or later, I'll get some..... :) need a reason to drive there anyway. B)

Edited by Bo Bo Olson

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

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