How Well Behaved Do You Find R & K Alt Bordeaux?

[dragos.mocanu]

Hello, I have a few questions regarding one of my favorite inks...R&K Alt-Bordeaux. Over the past few months I've been using it and observing some weird characteristics for such a supposedly well behaved ink. For starters, it appears to slightly fade/change color over the course of a few hours, turning from a purplish

burgundy to a rosy, raspberry-like color...which I also enjoy a lot, but which is lighter than the original.

 

Secondly, and more disturbing, is the fact that this ink seems to develop nib crud after a few days, regardless of the pen being used or not. However, I found that I could clean the nib with just a dry paper towel, and had no clogging (so far).

 

Has anyone else experienced these things with this particular ink? Thanks and have a great 2015!

[Algester]

inks will crystalize thats the problem and thats the nib crud your seeing is there a way to prevent this well... chemistry my friend chemistry the dyes used are either too reactive to oxygen thus drying up and the crystalizing but that also means your probably getting a more pure color (and or loss of color) because of this issue this also happens to very saturated inks such as reds, oranges ,and yellow (weirdly enough)

this event is also documented on R&K Helianthus, Diamine Ancient Copper

Edited January 2, 2015 by Algester

[JimCouch]

I have not run into either of these problems myself. My R&K Alt-Bordeaux has always performed reliably and well. Hmmm, haven't used my bottle in a while, may hae to ink a pen and do a little investigation.