Diamine Macassar

[DanielCoffey]

Since some folks were talking about browns, here is the wonderful Diamine Macassar...

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INK : DIAMINE MACASSAR

PAPER : RHODIA #16 A5 white lined

PEN : Onoto Magna 261 Medium nib tweaked for wet flow by John Sorowka (Oxonian).

Scanner : IT8-calibrated Epson V600 flatbed
Colour Space : Adobe RGB
Matte : 50% grey and 100% white
Post-process : Unsharp Mask





Here is a close-up of the swab. There was a slight metallic green sheen to this ink when laid down exceptionally wet but I was unable to reliably capture it on camera...




And a close-up of the shading. This ink would be a fair candidate for shading and might look good from a flex nib if someone could oblige...




Now, Diamine never says any of its regular inks are water resistant but there was something in this one that stayed on the paper. I saw a faint grey grid remaining in the soapy soak. If you dropped a page of Macassar in the sink, while 90% of the ink would wash away, there would be enough behind to salvage what you had written...




I wanted to see what was in this ink so I dabbed the swab q-tip onto kitchen paper and let it dry. A few drips of cold water caused almost everything to rush for the edges but there was a grey circle in the middle where the q-tip had rested. There is definitely something water resistant in this ink...




DRYING TIMES : The writing tests above were done in a very wet medium nib that had just been cleaned. Drying times were longer than expected... Xerox 90gsm was around 15s. Rhodia, G Lalo Vergé and Clairefontaine Triomphe took a good 45s to dry.

SMEARING : None on any paper. This ink bonds nicely with the paper and noes not sit on top, even on Clairefontaine Triomphe. A careless wipe with a damp finger, however, will result in the colour moving.

BLEEDTHROUGH : This ink showed less tendency to bleed through on copy paper than the other Diamines that I have reviewed recently. In fact I would say this ink is fairly tolerant to copy paper. Given the wet nib I used above, I recorded the following... Xerox 90gsm had slight bleedthrough and low feathering. Rhodia had no bleed through and no feathering. Clairefontaine Triomphe had no bleed through or feathering. G Lalo Vergé had no bleed through or feathering.

FLOW AND LUBRICATION : Flow for this ink seems to be medium. I suspect a dry fine nib might have issues but would we well worth trying. Lubrication was excellent in the pen tested (my medium above). The writing experience was very enjoyable.

CLEANING : There were no colour residues left on the converter and this ink washed out fairly nicely. It did not cling to the pen insides but a more thorough wash was needed to get the pen clean. Dark dye and saturated ink means a little more work needed to clean.

[rbadger332]

Wonderful review. I like the color. Might have to go on the purchase list. Thanks.

Asus TF300T / Tapatalk 2

[KrazyIvan]

I am not sure I like it. I bought my first full bottle of brown ink and it is Waterman Absolute Brown/Havana Brown. I am liking it so far.

[DanielCoffey]

You will find this a less red brown than Havana and a lot darker too.

Havana is a great brown ink and many folks choose it as their first brown. On FPN there was a discussion along the lines of how Havana seems to be the first brown for many but they then tend to move off into different shades.

In my opinion, Diamine Saddle Brown is a neutral brown with Macassar being the newer, darker version of that. Rustic Brown skewed to the red (and shaded awesomely) and Golden Brown took it to the yellow. There are all the inks around Oxblood and even some of the wine-coloured inks like Merlot which has a bit more purple than Havana.

And that is just Diamine... there are all the J Herbin browns to explore too...

[snedwos]

I bought a bottle of waterman havana a few days ago and fell in love. I love how it turns purple when mixed with blue...

[Bogon07]

Macassar seems an oddly interesting colour and I may have to accidentally add it to my ink list.
Nice grey brown colour.

[JustDaveyB]

You will find this a less red brown than Havana and a lot darker too.

Havana is a great brown ink and many folks choose it as their first brown. On FPN there was a discussion along the lines of how Havana seems to be the first brown for many but they then tend to move off into different shades.

In my opinion, Diamine Saddle Brown is a neutral brown with Macassar being the newer, darker version of that. Rustic Brown skewed to the red (and shaded awesomely) and Golden Brown took it to the yellow. There are all the inks around Oxblood and even some of the wine-coloured inks like Merlot which has a bit more purple than Havana.

And that is just Diamine... there are all the J Herbin browns to explore too...

Love brown love Macassar, Noodler's #41 Brown and Noodler's Walnut are good colours as well.

#41 Brown http://justdaveyb.com/2012/03/21/int...grand-place-2/
Walnut http://justdaveyb.com/2012/03/11/int...20-new-york-2/

[DanielCoffey]

Here in the UK we don't get the option of having Noodlers readily but fortunately Diamine is based in Liverpool so it made sense to see what they had.

[goldiesdad]

Thanks for the great review ... I ordered earlier today Noodler's Beaver a nice brown so I'll remember this one ....

[southpaw52]

I like brown inks. The Diamine is different enough to put it on my list of inks to try.

[KrazyIvan]

My Waterman Absolute Brown accidentally mixed with some unknown black ink and it came out looking very close to this.

[whych]

The Macassar is very similar to the old Parker Brown.
I have found in a wet pen it looks almost like black and you need a good natural light to be able to tell it's brown.
Great for using when you are forced to write in black, but want to be able to distinguish between the original and the copy.
As browns go, I prefer their Chocolate Brown - very much the same as Montblanc Toffee at a fraction of the cost.