Question. Comparison Of Mb Ebonite And Plastic Feeds.

[Cyclopentadiene]

Thanks for the variety of responses folks!

 

I'm sure from the research that I've done that the modern plastic feeds work well enough. Ebonite has a funny effect of seeming rather personal though, judging on my vintage pen experiences and that from Noodler's.

[fountainbel]

entropydave, there is no sure fire way of telling what kind of material the feed is made of. Only sure way to tell is the design of the feed. Modern plastic feeds work wells with modern stiff nibs but you run into problems if you use modern feeds on vintage MBs specially ones with flexible nibs. The reason being plastic feeds are limited in the amount of ink that can be supplied to the nib. This is the principle reason why nibmeisters will not modify non ebonite feed pens for added flexibility. This is another reason why vintage MBs write wet. I prefer ebonite feeds over modern plastic feeds because I like my MBs to write juicy wet!

 

 

Thanks for this clear explanation John , ........ I completely agree !

Francis

[Penne Stilografiche]

Last time this discussion came up, somebody posted the video below, Aurora pens, interesting to see the cutting/shaping of the feed.

I was also thinking about Omas, Aurora and other current pens with ebonite feeds.

Seems odd that cost cutting would be the reason to use plastic feeds in premium, flagship pens like the 149.

Even more odd that plastic feeds, (does that mean cheap feeds?) are used in expensive Limited Edition Montblanc pens.

Seems more likely that Montblanc designers have decided that plastic feeds are more dependable in service and quality control.

See the 2:12 mark of the video for feed cutting

:

That is so cool, I didn't even know they had that in one of their episodes. Thanks for sharing!