Laban Mento Informal Review

[penspenspenspenspens]

TL;DR Good for tinkerers who want a wide-bodied pen that isn't as heavy as the Jinhao 159 and has no step between the body and the section. Beginners stay away.

 

I will apologize up front for not having any photos to go with this review, but the Laban Mento is not a rare pen, so lots of photos are online already. This is a review for the tortoise shell version.

 

Someone recently posted on FPN (sorry, I forget the exact poster and post) that a fountain pen should first and foremost write: preferably right out of the box, but certainly after an initial flushing.

 

The Laban Mento I ordered failed that test, but I ended up liking it after tinkering with it.

 

After recieving my Laban Mento, I flushed its nib section with water, let it air dry overnight, then inked it up with the included converter. It wouldn't write. I don't know enought about nibs to be absolutely sure what the problem was (maybe the tines were pressed together?) but this gave me the excuse I needed to swap the included medium nib for a Goulet broad nib anyway. (I prefer broad nibs, but the Laban Mento I wanted only came with a medium nib.)

 

It took a bit of futzing, but once I got the Goulet nib properly aligned with the feed, it wrote fine, except for after sitting capped for a while.

 

Apparently the Laban Mento used to cost less but had a cheaper way of fastening the clip to the cap, and that cheaper fastening method let air into the cap. The newer model that I got still allows air into the cap (which I verified by blowing into the cap and hearing air escape).

 

Other FPN posters said that clear nail polish helped seal the cap, so that's what I did, and it worked. There was still a bit of hard starting, but the situation was better.

 

There's also a small hole at the end of the body, so I used yet more clear nail polish (dripped into the inside) to seal that, and, after a few days of drying, now my Laban Mento seems to be air-tight enough that I rarely get hard starts after leaving it capped for a day before using it.

 

I have to say that now that I've put the work into it, I really like my Laban Mento. I prefer fat-bodied pens, and the Mendo is as fat as a Jinhao 159. I also tend to grip pens up on the body behind the secion, so the fact that there is no step-down between the body and the section makes for a very comfortable writing experience. (The Jinhao, like many pens, has a step, and I don't like that.) The threads on the barrell are not a problem to holding the pen at all.

 

I like that the pen is pretty much the same size as a Jinhao 159, but lighter. I tend to write notes, not opuses, so I don't benefit hugely from a lighter pen, but even for short jotting sessions, ligher is nicer.

 

I also think the pen is pretty. Aesthetics have to take a back seat to functionality, but if you can have both, why not? I got the tortiose shell version, and I think it looks rather classy. I think I may be in the minority on this, but I actually prefer a black section rather than one that matches the body, and that's what my Laban Mento has. I like the contrast.

 

That being said, it's pretty crazy the amount of work I had to put into a $100 pen to get it to a point where it writes reliably, especially when I compare that experience to my far cheaper Lamy Safaris or Nemosine Singularities that worked right out of the box! Both of my Conkliin Duragraphs, priced above my Lamys and Singularities, but well below the Laban Mento, also have been reliable writers right out of the box, also never hard start, and provide beautiful, 1920's styling to boot.

 

Pretty much the only axis my Laban Mento wins on is width: I wanted a fat-bodied pen, most pen makers reserve fat-bodied pens for their multi-hundred-dollar flagship models, and the Laban Mento came in at a little over $100, even after buying a Goulet nib for it.

 

So I will iterate my summary from above: the Laban Mento would turn a beginner off fountain pens because, out of the box, it's poor at being a pen. But for a tinkerer looking for a wide-bodied pen that is lighter, better shaped, and perhaps more aesthetically pleasing than a Jinhao 159, but that won't break the bank, I'd say it's worth a go.

 

If the extra weight and step between the body and the section of the Jinhao 159 do not bother you, save the money and don't get the Laban Mento.

[Pickwick]

Interesting review, where did you buy your Laban Mento? If it had been me I would have sent it back to the seller demanding a refund without any hesitation, because of the cap problem for one, let alone having to make adjustments to the nib. Even at the price range of this Laban model I would never have considered it a cheap buy. If Laban happens to read your review let's hope they pay closer attention to their quality control in the future.

[Uncial]

I think the Laban Mento Tornado made it onto sbre brown's GOAT list once. I'm not sure I'd go that far to be honest, but I've found it a sturdy, reliable pen. It's a bit of a beast but very pleasant to use.

[georgeb]

I dripped candle wax on the outside of mine to seal it. I might try the clear nail polish.

[penspenspenspenspens]

I hope those who read my review found it helpful! Pickwick, I got the pen through Amazon, if I recall. A combination of laziness / desire to learn made me want to tinker with the pen instead of return it. I had read some other reviews of the Laban Mento here and knew about the cap issues, so I kinda knew what I was getting into, and figured I'd be playing with it at least a little bit.

 

The not-writing part was a bit of a surprise. But I've done nib swaps on a number of less expensive pens (good practice!), so even that part was not a particularly big deal. And at least I was able to prove it wasn't the feed. :-)

 

georgeb, the clear nail polish worked (I got the idea from posters here on FPN) but do let it dry for a few days. I was impatient, and the pen still had the nail-polish smell, and it's not the best smell in the world.