Replicating Quill Nib On A Fountain Pen?

[andymcc]

I use my fountain pens mainly for drawing and I'm currently using a TWSBI Diamond Mini EF, Noodler's Ahab and Serwex 162. I'm trying to replicate the old master drawings that used quill pens, I've tried italic nibs that seem to make similar marks using a Rotring Artpen but I'm looking for one that has the spring/flex too and the Rotring is rigid.

I don't know if anyone can recommend either a nib that might fit the Ahab or a pen and italic nib combination that I can try, I don't mind buying another pen to add to my collection...who does

[jar]

Look to vintage pens.

[ANM]

I doubt you will find any modern fountain pens that write like a feather quill. There are some steel dip pens that have good flex. You might even find one that will fit in one of your fountain pens but just put it in briefly. If you leave it in for a day or two, it will start to rust and possibly cause a mess in your fountain pen. Some vintage pens have nibs with good flex but it is difficult to say such and such WILL have a flex nib. It may but pen companies made several nibs for different uses and some are not flexible or not very flexible. Having said that, you may come across one in the wild for a little $. Lady size pens from the 1920's and before often have flexible nibs. Waterman and Eversharp made nice flex pens and you are more likely to find a nice nib like that in one of them than in, say a Parker or Shaffer... but they made some wonderful flex nibs too... just don't see them as often.

[psfred]

Technical drawing were made with drafting pens, not flex nibs. I assume you are looking to control line width, correct?

 

Drafting pens (old school) have two parallel sides that spring away from each other and are held together by a nut on a screwthread. This nut is used to control the line width and the "pens" are dipped in India ink to draw with. My father had a set, and was delighted when Kohinoor came out with their Rapidograph set with multiple size pens -- vastly easier and far fewer wasted prints.

 

Get a Rapidograph set if you want controlled line width -- flexible mibs are intended to duplicate the penmanship of a quill, which is by it nature very flexible. It will be impossible to control the line width reliably on paper.

 

However, if you want variable line width, I would suggest a dip pen as these will duplicate a quill very nicely. Lots of dipping in ink, but that's the price you pay for writing with quill anyway. Vintage flexible "wet noodles" are out there, but likely to be quite pricey. They are also easily damaged by poor technique, so I'd learn on a dip pen first anyway -- they are cheap, good flexible gold nibs are NOT.

 

Peter

[andymcc]

Thanks everyone for the comments

I have a vintage Morrison pen and it's perfect for what I want but the nib is delicate and I can see me breaking it if I use it for sketching/drawing so I wanted to use it only for writing. I also have dip pens which are great but not really portable, I like fountain pens as they can be taken anywhere and have a constant ink flow. I may have to live with the rigid italic nibs in the Rotring or try something like the TWSBI italic nib in my Mini, thanks again