Temperamental Lamys

[Mark from Yorkshire]

In the past few years I have had a Safari die on me. Despite repeated attempts to wash/ flush it through having not caught the cartridge running out in time I could not get it writing.

 

Now the Al-star that replaced the Safari last year is playing up despite regular cleaning and flushing with clean water. I also wonder if it is the Lamy ink especially the black that has been on the shelf a while that is drying up in the cartridge and in the workings of the pen.

 

Am I better off 

 

A) storing vertically 

B ) using converter and Quink black ink or other ink

 

or

 

C) both of the above

 

I am rapidly going off Lamy ink, especially there cartridges as they do not seem to last all that long before I am putting a new one in either of my Lamy pens

[senzen]

I have seven Vistas, I find them reliable pens as long as I keep them stored in pen pouches, I've also resorted to putting clear tape over their windows, but I just care about consistent ink colours a lot.

 

You can clean them with a drop of dishwashing liquid in a cup of a water, a bulb syringe makes this quick; if even with that the pen doesn't start, you can disassemble the feed, it comes in two parts, and go over it with a toothbrush, particularly the ink channels; be careful not to lose the top part, it's a long rectangle.

 

I use inks from many well known brands, the only one that will eventually clog a Vista is Rouge Hématite, as it does for all pens; even Orange Indien keeps on flowing even if crud is deposited on the nib.

 

[jchch1950]

Maybe another ink will work better on your Lamy.

[bogiesan]

any fountain pen can dry up. I use a variety of inks including Lamy.  I have a dozen Lamy Safaris, Joys, LX, and AlStars. I have never had one become a problem pen but perhaps my experience is atypical.

[AmandaW]

^ same here.  Yes, they do dry out, but my climate is challenging for all fountain pens - very hot, very dry for a large part of the year - but manageable.

 

I keep the Safari, Al-Star and Lx  as my Winter  pens. Come those first misty Autumn rains all the Lamys come out to play... And, any other time, they are easy to strip down and clean if they do get clogged it's not that much of a problem.

[tim77]

Are the cartridges still full?  If there's much more than ~4mm of air in the cartridge the ink is drying out, becoming sticky and viscous.  Even sealed cartridges slowly dry out.

 

Does the pen work ok when clean and with a fresh cartridge?  Once started it ought to be ok for a few weeks, as long as the pen is used every few days.  If it isn't then something isn't sealing properly - likely either the cartridge mouth or the cap.

 

When the pen is nearly empty the ink volume is so low that it starts to dry out more easily.  Ink strokes get thinner and the nib moves less easily.  Ideally refill the pen before it stops writing completely.  Otherwise a drop of water from a finger-tip onto the nib will get you going again, albeit with paler writing.

 

[Linedog]

With my Lamy’s I find the performance is half pen/nib and half ink. I look for inks that flow and are smooth, sometimes I sacrifice dry time but it works for me. 

[Mercian]

On 2/26/2022 at 6:11 PM, Mark from Yorkshire said:

 

I am rapidly going off Lamy ink, especially there cartridges as they do not seem to last all that long before I am putting a new one in either of my Lamy pens

Lamy’s cartridges are fairly large and hold a decent amount of ink.

That said, if your pen has a 1.9mm italic nib on it, it will run through the ink far faster than a pen with an EF nib.

 

I personally use a Z28 converter in my Safaris & Vista. The nibs on my pens are not very broad - mine are EF, F, & M.

Using a converter to fill from a bottle of ink is alleged to improve ink flow through one’s pen, because ink flows through the feed in both directions.

And of course the converter only holds about half as much ink as the T-10 cartridge, so one’s pen is getting refilled twice as often, and so ink has less time to ‘dry out’ inside the grip-section/feed.

 

More importantly than those factors though, is the huge premium that one pays for ink in cartridges compared to ink in bottles. Lamy’s T-52 bottles hold a good amount of ink (50ml).

Iirc, Lamy T-10 cartridges hold about 1.4ml of ink.

At e.g. thewritingdesk.co.uk, a pack of 5 of those costs £1.98, for ~7ml of ink = 24p/ml

At the same vendor, a T-52 of Lamy ink costs £8.88 for 50ml of ink = 17.7p/ml.

If you only use your pen to e.g. write a couple of letters per year this difference is trivial, but if you use it all the time at school/uni/work, the costs soon add up. And if you (like I do) have Yorkshire blood, you are probably quite likely to regard the extra price of ink in cartridges as an intolerably-extravagant waste o’brass 😉

 

If you write loads, and so don’t want to use a converter because of its lower ink capacity, thewritingdesk will sell you a ‘Filling kit’ - a syringe with a blunted needle that you can use to suck ink out of a bottle and then put in to an old empty cartridge to re-use it. They sell two versions; £1.50 gets you the syringe, blunted needle, and a cap for the needle, or £3 gets you all of those plus a plastic bottle that you could use to carry ink on holiday/work trips.

 

One final thought; using converters or refilling cartridges enables you to use any bottled ink, rather than you being ‘tied to’ Lamy inks from their proprietary cartridges.

Wrt your problems with Lamy black, I cannot offer an informed comment - I have only used the Lamy ‘Blue’ cartridges that came with my pens, the LE ‘Dark Lilac’ and ‘Petrol’ that came with those Safaris, and Lamy Turquoise that I initially bought in cartridges and have now bought in a bottle.

None of those inks have ever caused any problems in my Lamy pens, but then I haven’t ever left any of them alone long enough for the ink to dry out in them.

I have also had the same ’no problems’ results in my Lamys when using Sailor ‘Kiwa Guro’ (a pigment-based black ink); with Parker Quink ‘Blue’ (not ‘Washable Blue’), and; with Noodler’s Black (until my bottle went ‘off’ after seven years of ownership, and I suddenly found that my old ink would no longer flow through my EF nibs at all).

 

I suspect that your problems with Lamy Black might be occurring if you are using (or leaving) your pens in an environment with very strong air-conditioning. That can cause air to become very ‘dry’, and so pens like the Safari and AL-Star can suffer from the water evaporating from their ink, which makes them more likely to clog with now-concentrated dyestuffs, and of course for there to be a lower volume of ink left in the cartridges, so that you run out of ink more-often.

If you are using your pens in a very arid school/office/warehouse/etc, your best bet is to always take them home with you after work, so that the evaporation doesn’t continue while you are away from your pen.

 

I wish you good luck finding a solution to your problems 

 

Slàinte,

M.

[Mark from Yorkshire]

Thank you all, The Al-star currently now running red sheaffer ink and behaving itself now. Only put the converter in earlier in the week so will report how we get on. Yorkshire born Yorkshire bred