Jump to content

Sailor fountain pens


andyv108

Recommended Posts

Greetings. I have a straightforward request for a recommendation(s) regarding ink for Sailor fountain pens. Specifically, a blue or blue-black ink that is safe, reliable, smooth on paper, dries reasonably fast, and works well in a Sailor fountain pen. I tried the "Search" function but it didn't produce any results that were helpful. My computer skills are limited so my wording was probably too vague. In any case, your recommendations are appreciated.

 

Thanks in advance for your response.

 

emiliano

San Antonio, TX 78231

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 12
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • Nurmister

    2

  • mke

    2

  • arcfide

    2

  • jandrese

    1

Top Posters In This Topic

While there are a tone of such inks out there, and most of those inks are going to work very well in your Sailor, you should, IMO, first consider that Sailor makes some of the best inks around, and their black and blue-black standard ink lines are not only affordable, but also very wet, free-flowing, vibrant, professional, and work very well with Sailor pens. They are very well done inks that are very easy to work with, and I can easily recommend them. There are plenty of other inks that you can find that will also work, but starting there will give you a good baseline. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, arcfide said:

While there are a tone of such inks out there, and most of those inks are going to work very well in your Sailor, you should, IMO, first consider that Sailor makes some of the best inks around, and their black and blue-black standard ink lines are not only affordable, but also very wet, free-flowing, vibrant, professional, and work very well with Sailor pens. They are very well done inks that are very easy to work with, and I can easily recommend them. There are plenty of other inks that you can find that will also work, but starting there will give you a good baseline. 

What he said.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

> first consider that Sailor makes some of the best inks around

I didn't know that there is a reliable ranking. How about "first consider that Sailor makes some good inks"?

 

Anyway, while not the brightest blue inks, Sailor Blue and Sailor Blue-Black are reliable inks.  Otherwise, nice blue inks are "Monteverde Horizon Blue" and "Waterman Serenity Blue" which I can recommend. All four are easy to obtain in the US.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have a King of Pen Ebonite and a Pro Gear King of Pen (both with a superb 21K nib in M) permanently inked with Iroshizuku Tsuki Yo and Shin Kai respectively. Perfect. No need to change.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Pilot ink, 100%.

 

If you write a lot, the standard Pilot blue and blue-black in the 350 ml bottles can be had for about 25 USD on ebay.

If you want more interesting variants of blue and blue-black, consider the Pilot iroshizuku line. A wonderful blue-black is the shin-kai.

 

In either case, the inks meet absolutely all of your requirements. Moreover, these inks are relatively water- and fade-resistant, and do not stain plastic, or have strange reactions with common pen materials.

 

This is my conclusion after trying a large number of Japanese and German inks. I use Pilot ink with all of my pens.

 

The topside of a nib is its face, the underside its soul (user readytotalk)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/8/2021 at 11:36 PM, andyv108 said:

Greetings. I have a straightforward request for a recommendation(s) regarding ink for Sailor fountain pens. Specifically, a blue or blue-black ink that is safe, reliable, smooth on paper, dries reasonably fast, and works well in a Sailor fountain pen. I tried the "Search" function but it didn't produce any results that were helpful. My computer skills are limited so my wording was probably too vague. In any case, your recommendations are appreciated.

 

Thanks in advance for your response.

 

emiliano

San Antonio, TX 78231

 

As others have said, why not Sailor inks?  Their standard blue is dark, and I really should get their blue-black, because I have a few Sailor pens, and love blue-blacks.

 

But I've filled Sailors with Waterman, Pelikan, and Iro, as well...l

My latest ebook.   And not just for Halloween!
 

My other pen is a Montblanc.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Nurmister

> I use Pilot ink with all of my pens.

While I also like Pilot Iroshizuku inks, I would like to mention that Pilot inks are wet and that leads to problems with many papers if you want to use the backside too.

You really have to search for paper which matches the Pilot inks.

Sailor Blue and Blue-Black are OK with all papers I tested, even the bad ones - if I use a Fine or ExtraFine.

Problems occur if I use a Sailor KoP Medium (similar to a Sailor Broad of the normal series). The number of papers which can be used are reduced.

The recommended "Monteverde Horizon Blue" and "Waterman Serenity Blue" also work well with many of my papers.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, mke said:

 

While I also like Pilot Iroshizuku inks, I would like to mention that Pilot inks are wet and that leads to problems with many papers if you want to use the backside too. You really have to search for paper which matches the Pilot inks.

Sailor Blue and Blue-Black are OK with all papers I tested, even the bad ones ...  The recommended "Monteverde Horizon Blue" and "Waterman Serenity Blue" also work well with many of my papers.

 

 

+1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, mke said:

@Nurmister

> I use Pilot ink with all of my pens.

While I also like Pilot Iroshizuku inks, I would like to mention that Pilot inks are wet and that leads to problems with many papers if you want to use the backside too.

You really have to search for paper which matches the Pilot inks.

Sailor Blue and Blue-Black are OK with all papers I tested, even the bad ones - if I use a Fine or ExtraFine.

Problems occur if I use a Sailor KoP Medium (similar to a Sailor Broad of the normal series). The number of papers which can be used are reduced.

The recommended "Monteverde Horizon Blue" and "Waterman Serenity Blue" also work well with many of my papers.

 

 


Mmm this is a good point, I didn't consider what paper the user had. To specifically talk about what works with Pilot ink, I've found that:

1. Both the regular line and iroshizuku work well on simple, 80 gsm printer paper: no bleed-through. Note I use fine/extra fine nibs only.

2. While the regular line is slightly less wet and "penetrative" than the iroshizuku line, they both certainly show through on paper you'd get in an average big-box store notebook, even with a fine nib.

 

And so if you don't also tune your paper choices, Sailor ink would indeed be better. Pelikan 4001 is another fair option that has reasonable properties and can be found for very cheap in some countries (not sure about the US specifically anymore),  but it is definitely a bit drier than the similarly-priced Waterman ink, which makes a difference if you are using finer Sailor nibs.

 

Try a few inks or even ink samples (can be bought from Goulet pens, for example, on the cheap) and you'll soon figure out what works for you!

 

The topside of a nib is its face, the underside its soul (user readytotalk)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@andyv108 I think it would help if you could indicate what size of nib that you have. For instance, I have a B nib in the KOP that is very wet, and I like it so, which will change the choice of inks and recommendations significantly, as well as your choice of paper, desired level of feedback, flow, &c. 

 

Specifically: 

  • What paper will you be using?
  • What nib are you using?
  • What is your price range?
  • What level of flow/wetness do you want? 
  • What level of lubrication are you looking for? 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Most Contributions

    1. amberleadavis
      amberleadavis
      43844
    2. PAKMAN
      PAKMAN
      33501
    3. Ghost Plane
      Ghost Plane
      28220
    4. inkstainedruth
      inkstainedruth
      26627
    5. jar
      jar
      26101
  • Upcoming Events

  • Blog Comments

    • Shanghai Knife Dude
      I have the Sailor Naginata and some fancy blade nibs coming after 2022 by a number of new workshop from China.  With all my respect, IMHO, they are all (bleep) in doing chinese characters.  Go use a bush, or at least a bush pen. 
    • A Smug Dill
      It is the reason why I'm so keen on the idea of a personal library — of pens, nibs, inks, paper products, etc. — and spent so much money, as well as time and effort, to “build” it for myself (because I can't simply remember everything, especially as I'm getting older fast) and my wife, so that we can “know”; and, instead of just disposing of what displeased us, or even just not good enough to be “given the time of day” against competition from >500 other pens and >500 other inks for our at
    • adamselene
      Agreed.  And I think it’s good to be aware of this early on and think about at the point of buying rather than rationalizing a purchase..
    • A Smug Dill
      Alas, one cannot know “good” without some idea of “bad” against which to contrast; and, as one of my former bosses (back when I was in my twenties) used to say, “on the scale of good to bad…”, it's a spectrum, not a dichotomy. Whereas subjectively acceptable (or tolerable) and unacceptable may well be a dichotomy to someone, and finding whether the threshold or cusp between them lies takes experiencing many degrees of less-than-ideal, especially if the decision is somehow influenced by factors o
    • adamselene
      I got my first real fountain pen on my 60th birthday and many hundreds of pens later I’ve often thought of what I should’ve known in the beginning. I have many pens, the majority of which have some objectionable feature. If they are too delicate, or can’t be posted, or they are too precious to face losing , still they are users, but only in very limited environments..  I have a big disliking for pens that have the cap jump into the air and fly off. I object to Pens that dry out, or leave blobs o
  • Chatbox

    You don't have permission to chat.
    Load More
  • Files






×
×
  • Create New...