Red And Brown Ink Half Life?

[Goodbad]

I've had a bottle of PR black cherry lose most of it's color and this week pulled a bottle of Noodler's #41 brown and found that it too has lost its punch. My inks are stored in a cabinet, so they are protected from our strong sunlight in New Mexico. Is this behavior with reds and brown inks common, and what's an expected shelf life?

[MC_in_Houston]

Some red dyes and pigments are not stable. I've seen bottle of Brown Skrip that has turned to a greenish hue.

[RudyR]

Some red dyes and pigments are not stable. I've seen bottle of Brown Skrip that has turned to a greenish hue.

+1

I have seen a number of postings on the fugitive nature of red inks. Since some browns have a red component to them, I would say that they also would be similarly affected by time and nature.

[PDW]

I have an old bottle of Pelikan Blue-black that has gone an interesting shade of green.

[Trebster]

In my experience, it seems to be hit and miss with breakdowns of browns and reds. Some of my brown inks have demonstrated great stability over time, such as Penman Mocha. Others are not so clear cut. I've seen American production Skrip Brown go green (that really hurt, until I discovered Lie de Thé is an acceptable stand-in for old Sheaffer Brown). I had one bottle of Copper Burst go green about a decade ago, but Copper Burst has been stable for me ever since.

 

Never much cared for PR Black Cherry, and I couldn't say one way or another if my bottle of PRBC is true to spec or not.

 

Old Skrip Red seems to be incredibly resistant to the passage of time.

 

I can offer no theory on why some bottles go south and others don't.

 

EDIT: I wouldn't limit dye breakdown to browns and reds. A very old bottle of Omas Blue-Black (the iron gall version) decided to take a permanent holiday. What remained after its self-transmogrification was ink-ISH, but not really useful in any way beyond a free, empty bottle.

Edited April 15, 2013 by Trebster