The Perfect Pen For 2020

[Uncial]

Fasten your seatbelts, it's gonna be a bumpy night.........

 

A review follows of the Moonman M1000 fountain pen; the last Chinese pen I think I will ever buy. I've finally hit the wall! Now I like cheapies (although this is only just in cheapie territory) because I can take them on holiday and I won't cry if they get lost or damaged, but this one...well....

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/RbXHCUY9PkSBNVmL6

 

I had somewhat high hopes for this Montblanc knock off. It's a clone of the Purdey & Sons; a pen I can't afford so I went for a copy. It doesn't pretend to be anything other than a Moonman (and is branded as such) so I'm not sure it can bear the label of a fake, but it comes as close as possible - at least, it does until you get it in your hand.

 

Lets get some of the particulars out of the way. The pen can be bought for about €50 shipped and comes in a range of styles with different 'woods'. This is the 'black Ash' mode but be aware, it isn't black - more of a deep brown. It's a converter filled pen with a push in converter with a ball in it. The cap is a screw cap taking three turns to close. The pen does not post. Capped, it measures 148mm and uncapped it is 132mm. Uninked it weighs 64g and the pen without the cap is 44g. It has a steel nib, two-tone with the usual Bock goat stamp.

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/89DVdNthxvptDiU68

 

Now for the 'finer' points. The nib writes perfectly well, but is a very standard, dull, fine to medium writer - not too wet, not too dry. It has a tendency to dry out a little if left for a few days, but is nowhere near as bad as the former Moonman wooden pens which were a complete disaster and a total waste of money - mine ended up in the bin because they dried out in a matter of minutes and left for a day the whole pen could dry out, presumably due to the treatment of the wood that made it so dry. This pen will suffer dry out, but it's slow enough to make it useable, but in my book, any pen that suffers from dry out never stays in my collection. Life is too short for pens that don't function. The converter works fine. It seems a little cheap, but it works.

 

The above is the only good thing I can say about this pen, making it the perfect piece of *^%$ pen for 2020. You couldn't ask for a better coupling.

I don't mind heavy pens. I have some that are excellent writers, well balanced, very comfortable to hold and easy to use without getting tired. None of this is the case with this pen. It's heavy, badly balanced, has a terrible and hugely uncomfortable grip that is far, far too thin for the size and weight of the pen and will send your hand into spasms of cramps within minutes of use. The back end of the pen will waggle about furiously like a dying whale on a beach as you write. Just to top off the whole experience, the threads are very sharp and annoying and even if you try and hold it higher up there is a very, very sharp lip where it unscrews for access to the the converter.

 

The 'wood' looks nice but I'm not at all convinced it is wood. It does appear to have a grain but it feels really odd; almost like resin. I think it is some kind of plastic and feels this way; having the sound of plastic when tapped. The pen has a lot of metal parts (section, faux piston nob, clip, large band and cap end) which are all quite shiny and reasonably well tooled - except for the section. For some reason it feels slippery and cheap. I can already see wear through the shine of the threads. The end of the cap has a 'mother of pearl' insert which I'm also pretty certain is just a white clouded piece of plastic and in the flesh it's actually sort of ugly and in bright light acquires a sickly yellow tone.

 

The barrel has three tiny pinhead rivets set into lines on two parts of the barrel (six rivets in all). None of the rivets are equally spaced! They are meant to align with the clip (which bends so beautifully to one side) on the cap and a cluster of rivets on the back of the cap. Mine don't align. No matter how hard I try to tighten that cap, they will never align. I fear the pen is giving me some manner of ocd. The rivets are also proud of the 'wood' and some of them are sharp, so holding the pen in your hand is a little like holding onto some kind of grater. Maybe the cluster of rivets on the back of the cap could double up as a mini garlic grater.

 

This thing is dreadful - beyond dreadful in fact. It is just barely functional, unpleasant to use and a total waste of money. I delayed writing this review and wasn't going to do it, but honestly I really didn't want anyone wasting their hard earned cash in this horrible year on this terrible heap of junk. It made me really appreciate the craft that goes into so many pens to make them such a pleasure to use with such finely attuned and cared for materials. Even as knock-off's go, this is a whole new level of bad. If you wanted a pen to remind you of just what a truly rotten year 2020 was, this will fit the bill perfectly. 

 

[Uncial]

Apologies for the image links but I couldn't get them embedded in the post with a Google Photos link. I may have to read instructions!

[sgphototn]

I can see the value of cheap pens in that someone can try a fountain pen to see if they like the hobby. 

I've resisted buying Chinese acrylic pens. I know some people like them, modify them, and enjoy them, but there's no appeal for me.

 

Here's my idea of The Perfect Pen For 2020 - a Yard-o-Led Grand Victorian with a 1.3 stub that someone else bought and gave to me. That's perfect!

 

 

 

 

[como]

@sgphototn: I just saw the quote on your signature and had a good laugh! Thanks! 😀😀😀

[silverlifter]

5 hours ago, Uncial said:

If you wanted a pen to remind you of just what a truly rotten year 2020 was, this will fit the bill perfectly. 

 

[como]

@UncialUpon seeing your unusual but refreshing pen review, I suddenly had the urge to patriotically promote my recently acquisition: a Caran d'Ache 849, the biggest reason being that it's only 49 Swiss francs even if you pay retail. It writes without fail with perfect wetness for daily writing. It never dries out. You can find this neon coloured pen so easily anywhere! Best of all, I paid it with my dwindling airline miles. It's the only Caran d'Ache fountain pen I have and it's free!

 

Btw, why do we need a pen to remind us how rotten 2020 has been? It's not like that we will ever forget it 😀!

[inkstainedruth]

9 hours ago, sgphototn said:

Here's my idea of The Perfect Pen For 2020 - a Yard-o-Led Grand Victorian with a 1.3 stub that someone else bought and gave to me. That's perfect!

Wow!  That's awesome!  I should be so lucky -- but of course I'd settle for the Standard, since I expect the Grand would be too big for my hand.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Mech-for-i]

Cheap pen, expensive pen, it does not matter , I had cheap pen fail on me, I ad expensive pens ( even very expensive ones ) fail on me, equally I had cheap and not so cheap pens that delight ... this year's candidate for the pen to remind me of 2020 is none other than a box of vintage Dagong 600 student pen I got early this year, and the reason it was manufactured in Wuhan Circa mid 1970's

[XYZZY]

@Uncial thank you so much for turning your experience into an entertaining read.  I'm curious about that converter:  when I hear of a push-button converter I think of the Pilot CON-70.  Is it a knock-off of that, or something different?

[Uncial]

It's just a standard converter, not a push-button. Some of the listings of this pen describe it as a piston filler, which it isn't.