Sailor Sei-Boku Colour Match

[lysander]

I love the colour of Sei-Boku, it's like a dark turquoise blue-black which seems to have beautiful shading that goes from fairly bright blue to black.

However I don't need the permanent aspect and I don't want to have to deal with the additional maintenance and plastic staining that comes with it.

 

Are there other standard dye inks that come close to the colour ?

[Karmachanic]

I don't want to have to deal with the additional maintenance and plastic staining that comes with it.

 

 

I have not experienced either of these. I have been using this ink in the same pen continually these last four months without issue.

Edited May 30, 2019 by Karmachanic

[jmccarty3]

You might consider Waterman Mysterious Blue.

[A Smug Dill]

I have not experienced either of these. I have been using this ink in the same pen continually these last four months without issue.

 

 

Same here, and I've been using Sailor seiboku in converter-fed pens for years, without cleaning, flushing or refilling them any more often than my pens that are/were filled with other inks. I cannot think of a single reason not to use Sailor seiboku if the ink colour is suitable for a particular application; it behaves so well, doesn't bleed or feather (on anything I've tried), is completely waterproof (right down to the sheening components), dries fairly quickly and is not prone to smudging afterwards.

[lysander]

Thanks for the info. I've read of people having demonstrators stained and of the risk of forming insoluble deposits if it came into contact with other inks due to insufficient cleaning - I change inks fairly often.

Might be worth a try though.

[A Smug Dill]

For the sake of having discussion responsibly, I'll say that as I went to refill my Lamy CP1 with Sailor seiboku earlier tonight, I could see some 'staining' on the black plastic parts of the section/feed and the clear plastic tube in the converter. I put 'staining' in quotes because I neither soaked the pen parts in a warm bath of (very) dilute ammonia and detergent, nor use a commercial ink flush, to attempt to remove the colour; as well, I did not disassemble the converter to 'scrub' inside the tube with a q-tip. All I did was flush the nib, feed, section and converter with warm water, instead of giving the pen a proper clean, before refilling the pen with the same ink as before.

 

So, just to make sure there is no misunderstanding of what I wrote:

• As far as I'm concerned, staining is when dye or pigment either becomes chemically bonded to the surface of the material (which is, in the context of this discussion, plastic), or penetrated the material in a way that prevents it from being reached by cleaning agents or scrubbing instruments, thus cannot be removed.
• I have filled Sailor and Platinum converter-fed pens with seiboku in the past (and left them filled for at least a number of weeks). Those converters can easily be disassembled to allow 'scrubbing' with a q-tip after soaking the plastic, and to my recollection none of them showed any blue colour after such a cleaning procedure; so, as far as I'm concerned, there was no staining.
• If you change inks often, then the likelihood of staining is naturally lower as a matter of course.
• I understand some other users may not be prepared to disassemble a converter or a piston-filler and scrub the inside surface, and so their idea of 'staining' could just be colour clinging to the walls that does not readily wash off by flushing (or repeatedly filling and then emptying) with water only. I won't adopt that framing myself, but at least I've tried to be clear what I mean when I say "no staining".
• Oh, and of course a 'demonstrator' does not mean the ink necessarily touches the inside of the clear pen barrel; the vast majority of the (coloured or completely clear) demonstrator pens I have are converter-fed. For those users who favour demonstrators, I strongly suggest using converter-fed demonstrators if they don't want the clarity of the pen body to be marred by ink stains, since you never know if an ink will take to the particular plastic or resin in a given (piston-fill or eyedropper) pen.

[Karmachanic]

And then there's "cleaner" inks: https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/297645-whats-your-cleaner-ink/

[lysander]

Thanks for the detailed write up @A Smug Dill.

One other part of the equation for me is just staining in general.

I dont worry much about waterproofness or permanence of things I write - I expect and accept that if I spill water over them they will be ruined, but it is a rather unlikely event.

 

On the other hand, ink stains from fountain pens on clothes and furniture during normal use are fairly likely, and I would rather they were not of the permanent kind whenever possible.

[displacermoose]

I agree with everything here about sei-boku. It’s a great ink. That said, you might look into Iroshizuku Tsuki -yo for a good color match. The two are extremely close and Tsuki-yo is also very well behaved, but not permanent.

[lysander]

I agree with everything here about sei-boku. It’s a great ink. That said, you might look into Iroshizuku Tsuki -yo for a good color match. The two are extremely close and Tsuki-yo is also very well behaved, but not permanent.

Thank you ! Looks bang on, exactly what I was looking for

[displacermoose]

Thank you ! Looks bang on, exactly what I was looking for

Glad to help. I actually found Sei-boku when trying to find a permanent alternative to tsuki-yo.

[lysander]

I got a bottle of Tsuki Yo a few days ago and it's a lovely and quite subtle colour.

I initially didn't like it as it looked too green / teal to me but this was due to the lighting that was quite yellow.

With daylight or higher temperature lightsources it looks beautiful and as I expected Sei Boku to look like.