Sailor 21k nib durability

[kimpossible]

I recently purchased a 1911L with a 21k medium nib. The pen is on its way and I’m excited to try it out! However, I have heard a couple cases where the tines of the nib became misaligned after a while due to the characteristic of the 21k nib. Has this happened to anyone here and is it even an actual issue?  

[A Smug Dill]

Writing with (a properly tuned) fountain pen require little-to-no downward pressure on the nib, just to put down unbroken lines of ink consistently, so it shouldn't matter, or be of particular concern, that 21K gold (alloy) is supposed softer than 14K gold and stainless steel. On the other hand, if the user is sufficiently heavy-handed, then he/she could misalign or even ‘spring’ (i.e. inelastically deform) the tines on even a stiff steel nib, over time or even in a single sitting.

[kimpossible]

7 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

Writing with (a properly tuned) fountain pen require little-to-no downward pressure on the nib, just to put down unbroken lines of ink consistently, so it shouldn't matter, or be of particular concern, that 21K gold (alloy) is supposed softer than 14K gold and stainless steel. On the other hand, if the user is sufficiently heavy-handed, then he/she could misalign or even ‘spring’ (i.e. inelastically deform) the tines on even a stiff steel nib, over time or even in a single sitting.

I’m constantly anxious if I am heavy handed, though. Is there a good way to judge whether I am or not?Just as a reference, I’m currently using a Pilot Falcon soft fine nib and I don’t get any line variation with my normal writing pressure.

[Harold]

56 minutes ago, kimpossible said:

I’m constantly anxious if I am heavy handed, though. Is there a good way to judge whether I am or not?Just as a reference, I’m currently using a Pilot Falcon soft fine nib and I don’t get any line variation with my normal writing pressure.

You have to be really heavy handed to spring all but the softest specialty nibs. It's usually not until people try to see how flexible a nib is that they will spring it, which should be obvious because the only way to find out is to push it too far and go "oh, that was too far apparently". If you're not noodling a Falcon nib all over the place, you're not anywhere near heavy handed enough to spring a normal gold nib, whatever the gold content.

[awa54]

I'll second @Harold's observations, if you don't get any line variation at all with the Falcon/Elabo SF nib, then youre not particularly heavy handed.  When I write normally with my SF Elabo, there is subtle but visible line variation.

 

I just received my first modern high-carat Sailor nib last night, in the form of a black/rhodium Pro Gear, the 21k nib has a softer page feel than the 14k PGS nib and also has a small amount of line variation, which is accessible with just a slight increase in writing pressure.