How to reduce the linewidth and wetness of my MB 149?

[Severn]

Slightly more bleed through on the Moleskine, but it is the thinner paper too, so I'm not surprised. But personally I have no problems with the Moleskine and like the cream colour of the paper.

 

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

I still wouldn't use Moleskine, I understand they make a very good 'notebook' that many find the features good.

However I don't need a notebook; being retired. And again, why should I mess with a iffy paper, when there are good papers.

[Severn]

Well, that's actually how I use it. The Moleskine is a daily notebook, and then I have Rhodia notepads. Still, I stand by the fact the Moleskine is good quality paper for fountain pens from my personal experience.

[TCN01]

The Moleskine bindings are nice.  Leuchtterms are nice too, with a more “finished” paper.

[maclink]

3 hours ago, TCN01 said:

Interesting; how’s the bleed through?

Bleed through with moleskin paper is the showstopper for me.  

[Inunu]

Have you tried writing on the reverse side of nib?

The lines are way thinner and drier than the EF sample pen that I tried in store prior to purchase.

The writing experience is nowhere near enjoyable...

But hopefully that is something worth trying when you just have to deal with the worst paper on earth.

 

I have used a school notebook (the worst I can find) which further exaggerates the difference.
 

 

 

 

 

[mke]

Let's go back to the question of the OP.

 

I also recommend you revisit the boutique and test EF and F nibs. Don't start with searching a paper which makes a too broad nib a little bit less broad.

Take the paper and ink you regularly use with you and test. A Montblanc M nib is like Pelikan nibs for painting walls or for writing some intelligent quotes for Instagram.

Good luck.

 

[Bo Bo Olson]

3 hours ago, mke said:

Take the paper and ink you regularly use with you and test. A Montblanc M nib is like Pelikan nibs for painting walls

Especially if you start with a narrow Japanese printing nib.

If you print that is the way to go.

 

Western nibs are designed for flowing cursive script.

 

Yep, modern MB and Pelikan (outside the 200) are fatter than before....so ball point users don't have go to a three day seminar to learn how to hold a fountain pen. Crossover ball point and roller ball is the main market for fountain pen companies in the west.

.......................

 

Always take your good paper with you to your B&M.

I didn't.

Modern MB has a rep of being a fat nib...........of course some of that could be from folks that started with thinner than marked Japanese pens.

Thought others might well have thought so. The rep was a fat nib.

 

I bought a MB Virginia Woolf on sale. I was looking for a B, nibbed pen. It had an M, and wrote to the B I was looking for...on cheaper paper. At home on better paper it only wrote to the M it was supposed to.

I swapped in the nib of the new pen, and made a major mistake, in not adding I wanted that B in the middle of tolerance. I got back a B=BB....which one day I'll have ground down to a thinner B.

 

Thinner line, press less, in they seem to be a regular flex, so there is some tine spread.

Dry ink like 4001 Pelikan inks the driest; in Pelikan makes a wider nib so they meat in the middle when combining nib and ink. So should be a 1/2 a width narrower.

Waterman was once famous before Japanese pens hit the main stream for a thin nib, so had a wet ink.

 

MB for my tastes is a middle ink. How ever my tastes are 'old fashioned' formed a whole decade ago.

Back in the Day, Waterman inks were considered wet............now there are Noodler users who consider a Waterman ink..........dry.

 

Paper, ............. Rhoda 80 G or Clairefontaine Triumphe(sp) are slick papers so will have a thinner line. 1/2 a width.

So right ink and paper can = a full width narrower.

 

If you ever get any classic rough laid or linen effect papers, a M is a good nib to have.

 

If you ever try some two toned shading inks....I find a M to do a bit better than an F.

Of course you have to have 90g paper (outside the 80g Rhoda) to have shading with shading inks.

Lamy inks are on the dry side...(Lamy Green....stay far away from...far, far away...a worlds worst ink.) A decade or so ago, Lamy Turquoise was the base Turquoise all turquoise inks were compared too, a decade ago.

It was OK, a bit blaaaa. I looked at the then only two ink reviews on it...........and it Shaded!!!!!!!! Wow, no longer blaa. It did take 90g paper, to shade.

 

Ink Jet paper is the Major No No, for fountain pen inks....feathers, is wide...made to absorb Ink Jet Ink super fast.

 

So number one,  get some 90g paper for fountain pens.....a ream will last a couple of years, a 100 sheet box at least a year.

Oxford Optic 90g or it's = Clairefontaine Velout 90g are good inexpensive (cheap) spiral notebooks.

Folks coming into fountain pens or coming back after a life time in the ball point desert either go narrow or wide. I went wide. Only getting F's a model markers until I could get a wide nib. After (quite) a while I got use to F.

 

M is a very disrespected nib on the Com, in that is often the nib on the first new pens, and are not super skinny or fat....and one can pick up prejudices easy on the com as noobie.....some are stubborn and stick.

I now like M quite a bit.

 

So besides looking for skinnier than M, why not try some shading ink on that good paper you just bought. Before seniding it off to be made skinny.

If you get it ground to your width...of what you think an EF is....Shading Ink don't work with EF.