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thagbert
May 6th, 2013, 06:41 PM
There seems to be some prejudice against Noodler's among several pen experts (unidentified).

It may be that Noodler's is the new kid on the block and more established brands like to take shots at them.

Should I be concerned about using Noodler's?

KrazyIvan
May 6th, 2013, 06:46 PM
Pen hygiene and no issues here.

ethernautrix
May 6th, 2013, 07:06 PM
I have had zero problems with Noodler's Black, Walnut... some other colors. I'm glad I don't care about Bay State Blue, otherwise I'd have to think hard about risk.

There are some Noodler's inks that seem to have a greasy consistency. I don't like to use those. I mean, I don't use those.

Whatever ink -- pay attention and flush your pens (clean them). Should be fine.

Laura N
May 6th, 2013, 07:16 PM
I have talked to a fair number of pen restorers and vintage pen sellers, and I just don't know. I think "prejudice" is a strong word, since it implies something unfounded, whereas I can't ignore the experiences they relate.

And on the other hand, anecdotal evidence from Noodler's users is that most Noodler's inks are safe for most pens. I can't ignore that either.

I put it down to this: in my experience, all the more saturated inks, whoever the maker, seem to need more careful pen hygiene than less saturated inks. And all the Noodler's inks that I have used are very saturated. To me, "pen hygiene" includes not just careful cleaning, but also not keeping an ink too long in a pen.

Bay State Blue is a different matter from what I've heard, and not just the staining. I seem to remember someone here posting a picture of a Safari feed that was destroyed by BSB. And I have heard about that with another pen, too, though I can't remember the brand. My friends who use that ink all put it in a special-purpose pen. And they love it.

For myself, I've tried a lot of their inks, and they just aren't my cup of tea. But I love seeing them in my penpals' letters.

Waski_the_Squirrel
May 6th, 2013, 07:18 PM
I wouldn't worry. Clean your pen regularly and you should be fine.

The exception would be Baystate Blue and its family. They are chemically different. You should be more careful with these. The Baystate Blue in particular has a tendency to stain pens.

drgoretex
May 6th, 2013, 07:29 PM
I am absolutely not an expert, but yes, I tend to steer clear of Noodler's. Not because of any quality issue, they seem to be good inks, and the bulletproof ones are excellent. But, I have tried several of their inks, and find too much showthrough with all of them. Bear in mind, most of my writing is at work, and the paper quality there is poor. If I used good paper, my response might be different.

Well, there we go.

Ken

GourmetPens
May 6th, 2013, 07:34 PM
Yup, aside from BSB and the staining issue (which I knew about so I only put it in certain pens), I've had zero issues and I have.. *thinks*.. 8 bottles of Noodler's? I've put them in vintage and modern pens. I just don't let inks dry out in my pens, whether vintage or modern, especially saturated inks. But that goes for all inks over here, not just Noodler's.

caleath
May 6th, 2013, 08:07 PM
8 bottles here and I can't even tell you how many samples, only one problem. Whales mans sepia stained my Konrad, I have tried bleach, ammonia you name it.

pajaro
May 6th, 2013, 08:29 PM
I have used several of the Noodler's inks. No issues, it seems economical.

I have read some of the rants and articles by pen repair persons about Noodler's damaging pens. They don't seem to be able to present proof positive that Noodler's caused the damage in each case, but they have a hunch Noodler's is the cause. In some cases, like ruined sacs, there have been defective sacs on the market. How can they prove that's not the cause. Then came the "boutique inks" statement. The Pelikan people threw that at me about using non-Pelikan ink in their pen, causing the section to become unglued. It's easy for repair people to accuse the ink of being the problem. I say poor materials and/or poor workmanship is the issue.

There's about a snowball's chance in hades that I will buy any Pelikan ink.

These arguments blaming the ink are posh, tosh and gibberish.

jacksterp
May 6th, 2013, 08:30 PM
Have used 54th Mass. and Red-Black with absolutely no problems. I do dilute the 54th Mass. 4:1 with distilled water.

All in all, from what I have read, I would not be concerned about using Noodlers inks with the exception of Bay State Blue.

GardenWeasel
May 6th, 2013, 09:34 PM
Three of four of my currently inked pens have Noodler's in them. 5 O'Clock Shadow, Black Eel & Whaleman's Sepia. No issues and no problems. YMMV.

thagbert
May 6th, 2013, 09:50 PM
Three of four of my currently inked pens have Noodler's in them. 5 O'Clock Shadow, Black Eel & Whaleman's Sepia. No issues and no problems. YMMV.

That is my experience too. I'm checking out the rumors.

I had heard about Bay State Blue. Apparently it is the superman of inks.

I use the Bulletproof/Eternal inks for writing that I want to survive the ages.

Jon Szanto
May 6th, 2013, 10:26 PM
Anecdotal evidence is never conclusive evidence. A handful of inks is no guarantee.

However, neither is a blanket condemnation of Mr. Tardiff's products. One must bear in mind that he hasn't simply produced an extraordinary number of inks, as impressive as that would be. No, he has produced a wide range of inks of differing properties, and it is not hard to grasp that there are a lot of differences in the chemical and compositional makeup of those ink forumlas. For instance, BSB is very well known to be a, um, special ink. It is pretty much different from most any other inks (even, to a degree, from the other Baystate inks). To say that I have three pens inked with others (and I do, and more) doesn't say anything whatsoever about the performance and other aspects of BSB.

I love Noodlers, I really like the cut of Nathan's jibs (except for some of the politics), but I'm not blind to potential problems. To say "never use a Noodlers product in your pen" is probably not right, but certainly hedges bets; to say that "every Noodlers ink is perfectly benign" is the polar extreme. Something in the middle, taken with a grain of caveats, is probably on the mark.

Margana
May 7th, 2013, 12:21 AM
After ten years of using Noodler's, none my pens has been stained or damaged by it. I have 23 bottles, at least a dozen samples, and at all times at least one pen filled with a Noodler's ink. While there haven't been any issues, like most inks, it takes matching ink to pen to paper. When that is done well, it's a great product.

My daughter has had a Lamy Safari filled with Noodler's Black for years. That pen gets a cleaning about every third fill and it never fails to write well. I'm not fanatical about hygiene but I've learned how far I can push my pens to perform without a cleaning. A thorough rinsing between fills is good with any ink.

seffrican
May 7th, 2013, 01:58 AM
I am absolutely not an expert, but yes, I tend to steer clear of Noodler's. Not because of any quality issue, they seem to be good inks, and the bulletproof ones are excellent. But, I have tried several of their inks, and find too much showthrough with all of them. Bear in mind, most of my writing is at work, and the paper quality there is poor. If I used good paper, my response might be different.

There was a recent thread over in that other forum in which the OP suggested that many of the Noodler's ink are actually oversaturated, and that they may work better for many people if they are diluted 50:50 with distilled water.

I find the Noodler's inks that I have to be somewhat less free-flowing in certain pens than the rest of my inks. I have yet to try the dilution experiment though.

Nonsensical
May 7th, 2013, 02:21 AM
I would say that it is less prejudice against Noodlers ink as it is against more saturated inks. It seems that more saturated inks are meant to be "higher maintenance", and apparently used with care in vintage pens.

Personally, apart from my Parker vacumatic pens, I will use any ink in any pen. I have quite a few bottles of Noodlers ink, and enjoy using them very much. There are other "safer" inks that also tend to stain - I've found that several Diamine inks have that tendency, so I avoid using them in pens that are demonstrators, and can't be completely disassembled and cleaned.

The Good Captain
May 7th, 2013, 05:04 AM
I've had no issues with the few bottles I've been able to get. The only one I keep in a 'dedicated' pen is the Prime of the Commons which is in a black Pelikan 205. And that's just because of the nib-creep! Having said that, it looks really good with a blue-steel nib!

woosang
May 7th, 2013, 05:14 AM
I have a lot of Noodlers ink. I would say the same as others BSB is a special case and Q'ternity was odd all the others are amazing inks and worthy of a try, as for BSB, I now have a demonstrator Ahab that is now a shade of blue but as a dip ink it's fabulous.

carlc
May 7th, 2013, 05:30 AM
BSB ate my hamster.

Apart from that no problems with Noodlers (well any worse than any other inks - nib creep and the like).

carl

Annie
May 7th, 2013, 05:45 AM
No issues with any Noodlers inks and have never tried BSB. As with any brand of ink, I wouldn't leave it in, especially a vintage pen for a long time.

Sailor Kenshin
May 7th, 2013, 06:55 AM
I wouldn't worry. Clean your pen regularly and you should be fine.

The exception would be Baystate Blue and its family. They are chemically different. You should be more careful with these. The Baystate Blue in particular has a tendency to stain pens.

I dedicated a blue Peli Jr. to BSB. Just in case.

There are many Noodler's colors I love: Air Corps Blue-Black, Zhivago, Bad Green Gator, 41 Brown. There are many I dilute (yeah...like most of them).

Anyone interested in trying Noodler's, go get you some samples from like isellpens or Goulet. If it makes you nervous to put Noodler's in a vintage pen, don't.

tandaina
May 7th, 2013, 07:17 AM
Yeah I've heard that as well.

But NO ink is safe. After one pen expert (who I trust and adore) told me never to use Noodler's in a pen he sold me... Namiki Blue stained the same pen. I have since used all my Noodler's in that pen with zero issues. I will never let Namiki Blue near it again.

Pens are meant to be used, and they get used with ink so staining will happen to some pen, sometime. It is what it is, but I have never had any issues with Noodler's (never used the Baystate line).

jar
May 7th, 2013, 07:22 AM
I don't have what I would call a prejudice against Nathans inks, but gew interest me and I really wish he didn't fill the bottles so full. Less would be more Nathan.

jbb
May 7th, 2013, 07:34 AM
I found some Noodler's inks to be way too saturated so I no longer buy them.

Sailor Kenshin
May 7th, 2013, 08:04 AM
But water is your friend! ;)

jbb
May 7th, 2013, 08:21 AM
But water is your friend! ;)

I know but I became better friends with Diamine ink. Plus, those tall skinny Noodlers bottles are the worst.

jor412
May 7th, 2013, 08:34 AM
I have Baystate Blue, Green Marine, El Lawrence, Burma Road Brown (BRB), & Zhivago.

BSB stains everything it comes in contact with including the kitchen sink, but thankfully it does wash off steel & aluminum. I've had no trouble with it in my Pilot 78G which, apart from my Ahab, is the only pen I use it with. Green Marine & Zhivago have no flow issues and they're wonderful colors. Both El Lawrence & BRB need diluting. I would go slowly with that; maybe 20% water and 80% ink to see how it goes.

Interestingly enough though, I'm using undiluted BRB in my Platinum 3776 Century and I'm having no flow issues whatsoever. So maybe the solution, too, is a more airtight seal.

KrazyIvan
May 7th, 2013, 08:48 AM
While I really like the Noodler's inks I have, I guess I do have one thing against Noodler's but it is a minor quibble. "Against" is sort of strong and I am not sure whether it is Noodler's fault or the retailer's sample packages. I have received samples and then purchased a bottle with very different looking ink (Midway Blue). I get that Mr. Tardiff does all the ink mixing and maybe that's part of the charm but consistent ink color, especially when sampling, is sort of important to me. Especially when it comes to blue inks. Luckily the bottle ink was a nicer shade of blue than what I was expecting. It turned out for the best.

It has had me second guessing the purchase of Noodler's Air Corp Blue Black. I bought a sample and it was totally black for me. I have received letters in the ink that look totally different to what I have seen. I am using the same nib/paper combo's and wish my sample showed what I see in the letters I am getting.

Oh, and I will not touch BSB. Not for the rumors. I have personally sampled it. It was actually one of my first ink samples. I just don't like the color. It is too purple for my taste. The intense pen/sink cleaning needed to maintain it is also not something I like. (Yeah that's probably my OCD, I know. Don't judge me. :D)

Flake
May 7th, 2013, 08:52 AM
I have a few bottles and really have yet to have an issue with them. In fact, part of the reason I like this because they are so saturated, it's easy to have the ink seem weak with a tiny nib so I like the fact that it appears bright no matter what.

I also am a user of the notorious BSB, I happen to like the color. Admittedly there are several pens it's not allowed in, but even that i've had no problems with - admittedly Cape Cod Cranberry did turn my sink bit for a bit. :)

My theory is that as long as I keep my pens clean, I shouldn't have an issue with any ink, unless I just downright don't like the color. A few Noodler's will never endear me due to extreme feathering, but I've seen that with other brands too. Just my $0.02.

AlejoPlay
May 7th, 2013, 08:58 AM
I have a few Noodler's inks I love--Red/Black, Apache Sunset, Beaver, Navajo Turquoise, Bad Belted Kingfisher. There have been a few I have not been super fond of--Navy, Blue/Black, North African Violet (the first two just never quite dried fast enough for me and the 3rd clogged every pen I put it in). I think all ink companies have a few problem inks (and who knows they may not be problems once you put them in a pen that loves the ink).

I find Noodler's political content on the labels a little offputting for me, however.

jor412
May 7th, 2013, 09:01 AM
Oh, and I will not touch BSB. Not for the rumors. I have personally sampled it. It was actually one of my first ink samples. I just don't like the color. It is too purple for my taste. The intense pen/sink cleaning needed to maintain it is also not something I like. (Yeah that's probably my OCD, I know. Don't judge me. :D)

Sometimes, I like the color. I look for it and it has ruined every other blue for me in terms of brilliance. But the maintenance is a pain and after I'm done with the one bottle, that'll be the last of it.


I also am a user of the notorious BSB, I happen to like the color. Admittedly there are several pens it's not allowed in

hehe BSB sounds like a pet. I think I'm the only one in my vicinity who uses it.

AlejoPlay
May 7th, 2013, 09:22 AM
I have never been enamored of BSB. I tend to like my blues a lot more matted and with shading--Salix, Skrip Blue, Jentle Blue, Bad Belted Kingfisher, Namiki Blue . . . Kon-Peki is probably the brightest blue I have. I don't want anything bolder than that.

seffrican
May 7th, 2013, 09:36 AM
It's always difficult to have an even handed discussion when the thread title leans heavily in one direction.

Prejudice - such a pejorative term.

There are things to like about Noodler's inks, like the immense range of unusual and characterful colours, things not to like - depending on taste, at least - and things to be properly informed about when choosing one of them.

I seem to see a lot of the extreme positions here: either (a) Noodler's killed my budgie! or (b) Anyone who claims Noodler's might damage a pen is a nutjob!

Yes, I'm parodying, but it's not far off some posts in this thread so far.

Prejudice against Noodler's? Not much that I see. Caution, yes, on the part of some. Admiration and hero worship? Yes, some of that too.

Jon Szanto
May 7th, 2013, 10:05 AM
Very well put, Seffrican.

southpaw52
May 7th, 2013, 11:19 AM
I'm not a huge fan or user of Noodler's ink, I do have Noodler's ink. I think most issues with Noodler's is overblown. If you lazy about pen hygiene any ink has the potential of being problematic. Be kind to your pen rotate ink and clean regularly.

Sailor Kenshin
May 7th, 2013, 11:23 AM
While I really like the Noodler's inks I have, I guess I do have one thing against Noodler's but it is a minor quibble. "Against" is sort of strong and I am not sure whether it is Noodler's fault or the retailer's sample packages. I have received samples and then purchased a bottle with very different looking ink (Midway Blue). I get that Mr. Tardiff does all the ink mixing and maybe that's part of the charm but consistent ink color, especially when sampling, is sort of important to me. Especially when it comes to blue inks. Luckily the bottle ink was a nicer shade of blue than what I was expecting. It turned out for the best.

It has had me second guessing the purchase of Noodler's Air Corp Blue Black. I bought a sample and it was totally black for me. I have received letters in the ink that look totally different to what I have seen. I am using the same nib/paper combo's and wish my sample showed what I see in the letters I am getting.

Oh, and I will not touch BSB. Not for the rumors. I have personally sampled it. It was actually one of my first ink samples. I just don't like the color. It is too purple for my taste. The intense pen/sink cleaning needed to maintain it is also not something I like. (Yeah that's probably my OCD, I know. Don't judge me. :D)

I have a full bottle of ACBB and when it's diluted, it is reminiscent of Blue Nose Bear, without the feathering.

Barbara
May 7th, 2013, 11:39 AM
BSB ate my hamster.

Apart from that no problems with Noodlers (well any worse than any other inks - nib creep and the like).

carl

Next time you might want to leave a sandwich for BSB instead of your hamster.

carlc
May 7th, 2013, 01:18 PM
BSB ate my hamster.

Apart from that no problems with Noodlers (well any worse than any other inks - nib creep and the like).

carl

Next time you might want to leave a sandwich for BSB instead of your hamster.

Heh- I think BSB needs BLOOD!

It's a (British) joke based on the infamous headline:

2481

To be fair - as far as I know the headline was something of a misrepresentation (i.e. a lie) - he put it between bread and pretended (I don't think he did the full Meatloaf).

To be honest I have never used BSB - I've never liked the look of the colour but I do have other Noodlers inks.

Whilst I agree with Seffrican about the extremes that Noodlers can bring out in discussions I must say I haven't seen much of it here - unlike some of the threads on FPN (before the crackdown on ink bashing), now they got really silly. :tinfoil3:

carl

fountainpenkid
May 7th, 2013, 02:37 PM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.

Jon Szanto
May 7th, 2013, 03:41 PM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.
Your hands are not a pen - what did it do to the pen?

reprieve
May 7th, 2013, 04:12 PM
My experience with Noodler's inks has been largely positive. I use Purple Heart, Walnut, Black Swan (English & Australian), Forest Green, Dark Matter, Black, Burma Road Brown, Cayenne, Apache Sunset, Tiananmen, Widowmaker, and some others that I'm forgetting off the top of my head, on a regular basis.

The only issue I've ever had was with La Reine Mauve. It clogged every pen I tried it in, and it stained an Omas nib (that nib is still purple after two years and much scrubbing). I'm generally not a fan of the viscous eternal inks that smell like sharpies, though. The regular old "ordinary" inks (the ones without superhero properties) have been great.

fountainpenkid
May 7th, 2013, 05:07 PM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.
Your hands are not a pen - what did it do to the pen?

I didn't want to test it in a pen after I saw the way it stained my hands. I may try other noodler's inks though.

woosang
May 7th, 2013, 05:14 PM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.

Blasphemer!! Lol I love that colour.. Looks great when used with a twsbi 1.5

I don't have ink brand loyalty.. If I like the ink and it works with my pens & paper then I'll buy it.

Bogon07
May 7th, 2013, 05:45 PM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.
Your hands are not a pen - what did it do to the pen?

I didn't want to test it in a pen after I saw the way it stained my hands. I may try other noodler's inks though.

Don't most inks stain your hands ? It washes off fairly easily.

Ottoman Azure is pretty intense and may take a few flushes to clean out of a pen but so do an awful lot of other inks.
Edelstein Adventure was very hard to clean out of one pen but not another for some reason.

If you have a valuable or hard to clean pen you have to weigh out the risks as to what you are comfortable with.

Jon Szanto
May 7th, 2013, 05:59 PM
Don't most inks stain your hands ? It washes off fairly easily.
If it washes off, I'm not sure it can be referred to as a "stain".

jor412
May 7th, 2013, 06:08 PM
The only issue I've ever had was with La Reine Mauve. It clogged every pen I tried it in, and it stained an Omas nib (that nib is still purple after two years and much scrubbing).

I've been dying to try this ink but other people's remarks are similar -- clogging, staining. Too bad. On screen, it looks fabulous.

reprieve
May 7th, 2013, 06:38 PM
The only issue I've ever had was with La Reine Mauve. It clogged every pen I tried it in, and it stained an Omas nib (that nib is still purple after two years and much scrubbing).

I've been dying to try this ink but other people's remarks are similar -- clogging, staining. Too bad. On screen, it looks fabulous.

It's a beautiful color, truly. Some of my pen friends were able to find a compatible combination--I think one used a Parker 45 and another had success with a Lamy 2000. Perhaps the hooded nibs helped with dryout/clogging issues. Nevertheless, the high maintenance is a bit much for me. I just want to pick up my pens and write, and I choose inks that will allow me to do that (including some other Noodler's).

jor412
May 7th, 2013, 06:44 PM
Me too. I'd rather not have trouble with an ink or a pen for that matter. That la reine mauve stained your nib is disturbing. I thought only BSB did that and BSB does come off my steel nib after scrubbing. BSB sticks to plastic though so I have it on my Black pilot but it isn't noticeable unless you look.

cwent2
May 7th, 2013, 08:35 PM
I so far have had no issues with Noodler's Ink. I am using Borealis Black and find it to be BLACK as coal. I am a fan of black, it matches my Harley. Also love Apache Sunset. I have an aversion to BLUE ink, think it has to do with being in the Air Force for 20 years, everything is blue this or blue that and if it don't move paint it Air Force Blue - So I wouldn't use BSB if something froze over. Just a new guy on the block. but thought I would share.

fountainpenkid
May 8th, 2013, 04:33 AM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.
Your hands are not a pen - what did it do to the pen?

I didn't want to test it in a pen after I saw the way it stained my hands. I may try other noodler's inks though.

Don't most inks stain your hands ? It washes off fairly easily.

Ottoman Azure is pretty intense and may take a few flushes to clean out of a pen but so do an awful lot of other inks.
Edelstein Adventure was very hard to clean out of one pen but not another for some reason.

If you have a valuable or hard to clean pen you have to weigh out the risks as to what you are comfortable with.
What I meant by stain is that it was hard to wash it off. Though maybe it was meant to be a permanent ink, in which case, good! I will fill my mini with the small sample I have.

Tracy Lee
May 8th, 2013, 04:56 AM
I haven't any experience with Noodlers yet, but let me offer for stained hands a magic eraser does an amazing job cleaning you up - at least with other inks I have used. For clothing stains, saturate with hairspray before you wash. You can even use hairspray to remove ink from a photo and not ruin the emulsion on the paper. It will even remove sharpie ink.

jjlax10
May 8th, 2013, 07:56 AM
I would say that it is less prejudice against Noodlers ink as it is against more saturated inks. It seems that more saturated inks are meant to be "higher maintenance", and apparently used with care in vintage pens.

Personally, apart from my Parker vacumatic pens, I will use any ink in any pen. I have quite a few bottles of Noodlers ink, and enjoy using them very much. There are other "safer" inks that also tend to stain - I've found that several Diamine inks have that tendency, so I avoid using them in pens that are demonstrators, and can't be completely disassembled and cleaned.

My understanding is similar. Many pen pros are concerned that a lot of modern inks have a high level of saturation and that might cause damage yet unknown. I have heard the same cautions about German inks and anything not Parker, Sheaffer, Waterman, Aurora or Japanese.

Gulfcoast
May 8th, 2013, 11:41 AM
I haven't any experience with Noodlers yet, but let me offer for stained hands a magic eraser does an amazing job cleaning you up - at least with other inks I have used.

Dumb question: What's a "magic eraser."

Sailor Kenshin
May 8th, 2013, 12:21 PM
Is it either that Mr. clean thingie or the bigger more industrial thingie they use to remove soot from walls!

Tracy Lee
May 8th, 2013, 07:13 PM
I use the Mr. Clean thingy. :) And after cleaning and flushing, I hit our horrible porcelain kitchen sink with toilet bowl cleaner, the kind with bleach in it. Completely eradicates ink stains. Sorry for the distraction, back to Noodlers! I have learned a lot here to apply when/if I try a bottle and I do have at least one color on my list of "to be purchased" inks.

fiberdrunk
May 11th, 2013, 05:38 PM
The more permanent the ink, the more often you can expect to have to flush your pens. I love the permanence of Noodler's bulletproof and eternal inks. I've only had 2 issues, and that was with Year of the Pig (highlighter ink) and Kung Te-cheng. Both permanently clogged the Preppys that came with them (after about a year to year and a half) and had to be replaced. I tend to only use Noodler's in cheap designated Preppys (eyedropper style).

thagbert
May 13th, 2013, 05:24 PM
Have used 54th Mass. and Red-Black with absolutely no problems. I do dilute the 54th Mass. 4:1 with distilled water.

All in all, from what I have read, I would not be concerned about using Noodlers inks with the exception of Bay State Blue.

What is the purpose of diluting 54th Mass.?

caleath
May 13th, 2013, 08:36 PM
I got a new Noodlers in the mail today from Gouletpens , 54th Mass, I am in love! My go to blue black now!

79spitfire
May 13th, 2013, 08:55 PM
I like Noodler's ink. The BSB chases the cat around from time to time, and I had to slap it when it made a pass at my wife, but you know...

But seriously, it's made to fit different needs. You need to keep that in mind when picking inks and be sure your aware of what will tend to stain and or dry out in a pen. Regular flushing and good hygiene will prevent most of the 'problems' that people experience.

Oh yea, Baystate inks stain like crazy....

mhphoto
May 13th, 2013, 10:29 PM
I have used several of the Noodler's inks. No issues, it seems economical.

I have read some of the rants and articles by pen repair persons about Noodler's damaging pens. They don't seem to be able to present proof positive that Noodler's caused the damage in each case, but they have a hunch Noodler's is the cause. In some cases, like ruined sacs, there have been defective sacs on the market. How can they prove that's not the cause. Then came the "boutique inks" statement. The Pelikan people threw that at me about using non-Pelikan ink in their pen, causing the section to become unglued. It's easy for repair people to accuse the ink of being the problem. I say poor materials and/or poor workmanship is the issue.

There's about a snowball's chance in hades that I will buy any Pelikan ink.

These arguments blaming the ink are posh, tosh and gibberish.

My thoughts exactly.

Biber
May 14th, 2013, 07:16 AM
My first experience with Noodlers, when I first got back into FPs, wasn't a good one, and out of the subsequent dozen or so Noodler's inks I've tried, only one or two have worked for me like I think an ink should - one oddly enough straight from the bottle (Aircorp BB), and the other only after I diluted it 3-1. They're just too wet, too saturated and prone to feathering too much for my liking. Perhaps I'm wrong in thinking an ink should be good to go straight from the bottle. I'm also a pretty obsessive ink review reader, and from all that I've read I have come to the opinion that I seriously doubt that Nathan actually knows what he's doing. But, damn it, those colors!!! They keep luring me back. In General if I find a Noodler's color I like I try to find an equivalent elsewhere, preferably Diamine, before I'll consider actually buying the Noodlers.

Pendragon
May 14th, 2013, 02:16 PM
I have had nothing but great experiences using Noodler's Legal Lapis, Black and Eternal Luxury Blue inks. They are stellar in every pen in which they were used. I never tried the Baystate Blue, but have read numerous reports of problems. A post on one forum showed photos of pen that had been stained by the Baystate Blue. It was a Lamy Safari, if I recall correctly. The entire thread later did a vanishing act, however. An employee in a pen store once told me that Baystate Blue had clogged her pen. The store might have received other complaints because they soon got rid of their entire stock of Noodler's.

If one, or even a few, Noodler's inks are problematic, that does not mean that all Noodler's inks should be avoided. Most of their inks seem to receive positive reviews. Glowing reports of Legal Lapis were a primary factor in my wanting to use fountain pens. Those reports proved to be quite accurate.

spotted and speckled
May 16th, 2013, 08:16 PM
I have about 30 bottles of Noodlers right now, (Total ink is about 100 bottles, well enough to last me into the next decade) none of which I have had a real problem with. I didn't like a few colors, so those found new homes. Pen Hygiene makes all the difference in the world.

I am still looking for the perfect pen to marry BSB to because that is such a great color, I should have something inked with it at all times. I have a Parker 61 capillary filler filled with English Roses, so I won't have to be away from that color for a long time.

Whenever some turns up their nose at Noodlers, I always say "Good! More for me!!"

dgator
May 16th, 2013, 08:25 PM
Noodler's Black was the first ink I used when getting started with fountain pens. I have not experienced any problems. It remains my favorite black ink.

pencils+pens
May 17th, 2013, 05:26 AM
I have no problem with Noodler's Dragon's Napalm or Black Swan in Australian Roses. I use a sample of Noodler's Hellfire, a highlighting ink, as my pink ink of the moment. I have no problem with any of them.

I have at least one pen inked with each of the first two all the time. My Noodler's Nib Creaper Pink Panther is always inked with a pink ink, currently Hellfire, and is only used to write notes to my wife.

Sailor Kenshin
May 17th, 2013, 07:15 AM
I have about 30 bottles of Noodlers right now, (Total ink is about 100 bottles, well enough to last me into the next decade) none of which I have had a real problem with. I didn't like a few colors, so those found new homes. Pen Hygiene makes all the difference in the world.

I am still looking for the perfect pen to marry BSB to because that is such a great color, I should have something inked with it at all times. I have a Parker 61 capillary filler filled with English Roses, so I won't have to be away from that color for a long time.

Whenever some turns up their nose at Noodlers, I always say "Good! More for me!!"

For BSB I use a Pelikano Jr. with the blue barrel...almost an exact match! Other people claim success with the Guanleming Demonstrator 2001. Of course, these are inexpensive pens. You may be looking for something more 'significant.'

snedwos
May 17th, 2013, 01:47 PM
A one man (an obstinate, bullish man at that) operation with hundreds of different inks. Yeah, quality control is going to be problematic. And consistency is just not going to be there. There will be some great inks, there will be some truly awful inks, even between batches of the same ink. But I'd rather Nathan kept trying to push boundaries, and keep up the variety, than cut down on production so that he can polish a couple dozen colours and have them perfect. It's like my penchant for the open source software community. You get bleeding edge stuff, but things rarely get polished, since that is fairly boring work, and the time is better spent developing the next cool thing.

Open source is something Noodler's inks are not, however. Even to the point where he'll remain tight-lipped when someone approaches him asking for allergy advice. The one true horror story I read is from someone who got ink on their hands and came up in a nasty rash. When they contacted Nathan about it to ask about the composition so the reaction could be treated, he refused.

This is the one thing I have read that has bothered me. I don't know how much truth there is to it, I don't know the details of the case. But the person who posted this (on another forum -- not necessarily THE other forum) was exceedingly angry, and if she was right, it seemed pretty unreasonable behaviour. It may have been resolved by now, for all I know.

Just to be clear I am not outright accusing anyone of anything, and, ultimately, I think I approve of Noodler's on the whole. How many people will have got into the hobby through Noodler's, I wonder? I know I didn't know there was such a thing as a flex nib, or that vintage pens were desirable until I saw a couple of his videos.

I have used Noodler's inks, not a problem. And I'm very happy with my Ahab. Would buy again. And I'm aware of the risks, so I'm careful about hygiene and pen selection. My Vac maaaay get some Apache Sunset one day, but BBK? No way.

cwent2
May 17th, 2013, 01:56 PM
How many people will have got into the hobby through Noodler's, I wonder? I know I didn't know there was such a thing as a flex nib, or that vintage pens were desirable until I saw a couple of his videos.

@SNEDWOS I didn't expand into fountain pens because of Nathan Tardif and his videos, but I am glad they were available as I learned quite a bit from them - along with folks from here and other's. I would say I am a hands on type, and like to know the what and why.

Just my 2 cents.

Honey Mustard
May 17th, 2013, 11:58 PM
It seems like you've received many responses, but I thought I'd throw my $.02 in as well. Personally I don't use Noodler's inks any more mainly due to poor performance among other issues, and if I did I would not use them in any vintage pens I would mind losing. It seems to be a very common thread among pen restorers that what they call "boutique inks" (mainly Noodler's and Private Reserve as far as I can tell) damage pens. Now many fans of Noodler's vehemently dispute these claims, but the fact still stands just about every restorer out there who see more pens a month than most of us do in a lifetime say that these boutique inks are unsafe.

And as someone else mentioned, I don't think its prejudice against Noodler's inks in particular, just newer inks that have a tendency to be highly saturated, of which Noodler's happens to be the most well know of.

Biber
May 19th, 2013, 10:01 AM
[QUOTE]@SNEDWOS I didn't expand into fountain pens because of Nathan Tardif and his videos, but I am glad they were available as I learned quite a bit from them - along with folks from here and other's. I would say I am a hands on type, and like to know the what and why.

Just my 2 cents.

I'm afraid I have little patience to sit through his videos. If anything they turn me off to his ink even more so. His videos are so long and he talks so slow I just want to shoot myself after 2 minutes.

Biber
May 19th, 2013, 10:12 AM
A one man (an obstinate, bullish man at that) operation with hundreds of different inks. Yeah, quality control is going to be problematic. And consistency is just not going to be there. There will be some great inks, there will be some truly awful inks, even between batches of the same ink.

I participated in a discussion at FPN where this came up and it was suggested that Nathan purposely didn't try for 100% consistency among batches. While I can, to some degree, appreciate the idea of liking the variety of character this may give to the ink, I don't think it's at all a good thing. I, like many people shop for ink via the reviews and posted examples (preferably photos) of others, and it's hard enough trying to account for the variations of tint and hue representation online - varying color calibrations of monitors, scanners, cameras etc - without the actual color of ink itself being a moving target.

TSherbs
May 19th, 2013, 02:24 PM
I have been quite satisfied with the Noodlers inks that I have purchased. They came exactly as described, exactly as reviewed (in the thorough reviews on FPN). Not every ink is great in every pen. And, there are dozens of Noodlers inks I have no interest in whatsoever simply because the colors don't please me for one reason or another, or the reviews are underwhelming. :noidea:

snedwos
May 19th, 2013, 02:49 PM
[QUOTE]@SNEDWOS I didn't expand into fountain pens because of Nathan Tardif and his videos, but I am glad they were available as I learned quite a bit from them - along with folks from here and other's. I would say I am a hands on type, and like to know the what and why.

Just my 2 cents.

I'm afraid I have little patience to sit through his videos. If anything they turn me off to his ink even more so. His videos are so long and he talks so slow I just want to shoot myself after 2 minutes.

Oh, that happens to me too! I'm just pointing out that they were a threshold for me. Then I found Stephen.

JustDaveyB
May 20th, 2013, 07:11 AM
I will add my 2c worth. I have lots of Noodler's ink (64 bottles to be exact), they range from the infamous BSB to normal garden variety black. Some of them have their quirks yes La Reine Mauve is a bit clogy for me too. I use a database to track my collection so I rate all my inks vs my pens - suffice to say the more chemically potent and highly saturated Noodler's inks don't get a run in my expensive Pelikans. Like many here I exercise good pen hygiene and no ink stays in a pen for more than 14 days. I have never had a problem with any of my Noodler's inks staining.

Runnin_Ute
May 21st, 2013, 08:23 PM
I have only tried a couple of Noodler's inks - Walnut and 54th Massachusetts. Only bought one (54th Mass.) to date. Walnut just was not my thing. Don't remember what, but something about it just didn't appeal to me. (actually the brown I have tried that I like most is Monteverde Brown- yeah, boring name, but good color)

Pendragon
May 21st, 2013, 10:17 PM
Open source is something Noodler's inks are not, however. Even to the point where he'll remain tight-lipped when someone approaches him asking for allergy advice. The one true horror story I read is from someone who got ink on their hands and came up in a nasty rash. When they contacted Nathan about it to ask about the composition so the reaction could be treated, he refused.

This is the one thing I have read that has bothered me. I don't know how much truth there is to it, I don't know the details of the case. But the person who posted this (on another forum -- not necessarily THE other forum) was exceedingly angry, and if she was right, it seemed pretty unreasonable behaviour. It may have been resolved by now, for all I know.

How many inks are open source? Not any of the commercially sold inks, at least not that I have seen. They would have to be nuts to give up their formulas, which are their bread and butter. People with an allergic reaction do not need to know the ink composition, they need to know what to do if they get ink on their skin, if their kid drinks it, etc. It would the same as is done with some household cleaners and many other commonly found chemical formulations.


I have used Noodler's inks, not a problem. And I'm very happy with my Ahab. Would buy again. And I'm aware of the risks, so I'm careful about hygiene and pen selection. My Vac maaaay get some Apache Sunset one day, but BBK? No way.

BBK is Bad Belted Kingfisher? If so, has it been proven to be problematic for a large number of users?

Chemyst
May 21st, 2013, 10:51 PM
How many inks are open source? Not any of the commercially sold inks, at least not that I have seen. They would have to be nuts to give up their formulas, which are their bread and butter. People with an allergic reaction do not need to know the ink composition, they need to know what to do if they get ink on their skin, if their kid drinks it, etc. It would the same as is done with some household cleaners and many other commonly found chemical formulations.

I'm not sure what you mean. Commercial inks (and paints and household cleaners, &c) have component lists and Material Safety Data Sheets available from the manufacturers as a regulatory and safety matter of course. If you are allergic, and certainly if you are allergic to more than one chemical, you would want to be able to screen products BEFORE you enter anaphylactic shock.

Perhaps you are thinking of the immediate care instructions if the ink is ingested. Things like "Immediately drink a glass of water and call your local poison control office. Do not induce vomiting." In which case, the poison control center checks the component lists and MSDS' and makes a recommendation to you over the phone.

It is also worth pointing out that ink formulations are not secret from anyone except the general public. Many inks are remarkably similar to each other on a fundamental chemical level and are a relatively simple matrix compared to things like natural groundwaters or wines. Anyone who has a professional interest in the composition of an ink can find out its precise make-up for a small outlay of time and money.

Talking about guarding the "top secret recipe" from the like of shadowy "copycat companies" and "Chinese industrial interests" is simply marketing. Consumers love feeling that the product they are buying is rare, luxurious and at the center of an intriguing story.

There is of course something to be said about the need to guard the processes used to manufacture an ink cheaply and efficiently, but this different than guarding the list of components. Key steps like how to produce uniform nano-particles of gold consistently for $XXX/g is worth keeping a lid on, while the fact that your ink uses YYY surfactant or ZZZ dye is not.

Any interested commercial ink company knows precisely what is in the NI line (and PR and MB and ...). Should an ink company come out with something innovative that would incrementally improve a company's inks, they would certainly look at it, but there is a reason that NI inks differ from Pelikan Inks. It isn't accidental.

Each ink meet the right intersection of profit, consumer demand and regulatory acceptance for the parent company. Other inks fall somewhere else on the spectrum that the other companies do not feel is optimal.

Consider:
-Ink that costs too much to manufacture cannot be sold at the price point for a target customer
-Ink that is too high maintenance will frustrate consumers and hurt repeat sales
-Ink that has inconsistent batch-to-batch color will frustrate customers
-Ink that damages pens will result in a large number of warranty claims and consumer complaints, both costing money
-Ink that uses toxic or otherwise prohibited components will not pass import/export regulators
-Ink that ...

This is all part of what separates mainstream pen makers who market ink from boutique ink makers. Mainstream makers want a non-toxic, consistent and low maintenance ink that works well for the vast majority of users. They could certainly turn out a product exactly like the boutique makers or even better, but the problems outweigh the benefits for them to do so.

blopplop
May 22nd, 2013, 12:34 AM
Noodler's ROCKS!!! I love it! I currently have about 15 bottles of various kinds.

MaddyMarcel
May 29th, 2013, 03:12 PM
Bulletproof black is my favorite ink. I also have used Luxury blue, Hunter green, Aircorp, Nikita, and Zhivago, and personally, I have never had problems.

Hez
May 30th, 2013, 11:27 PM
...

snedwos
May 31st, 2013, 02:25 AM
BBK is Bad Belted Kingfisher? If so, has it been proven to be problematic for a large number of users?

Not that I know of, but it is saturated and lubricated and has a distinct "painty" feel and gluey smell that does make me a little nervous. It's a little bit stainy too, at least IME.

AndyT
May 31st, 2013, 03:41 AM
The view from the other side of the pond. Here's an exhaustive list of what Niche Pens, the only official Noodlers stockist in the UK, has on offer today:

Bulletproof Black
X-Feather
Polar Black
Black Swan in English Roses
Rome Burning

And that's it. Postage costs and customs liability make importing your own an unattractive proposition. So long as this supply situation obtains I'm not going to get a chance to form any prejudices and Diamine, J Herbin et al will be mopping up most of the European trade in unusual colours.

snedwos
May 31st, 2013, 04:26 AM
Niche pens will stock up eventually, it's where I got my two bottles. Neither colour is on that list.

Mags
May 31st, 2013, 04:35 AM
I like Noodlers. BSB is amongst my faves! But as.folklore goes it stays out.of pens worth over $100. Thus far it has been in and out of several India pens and TWSBI demonstrator....it stains and it is water resistant so clean it off with some bleach and water...voila! the eel inks are easy flowing but.smear and as a leftie they dry SLOW in my ink stained south paw experiences.

I like Plains of Abraham by Noodlers as a sort of bullet proof ink more easily cleaned out.of pens. I used it in a few Aurora pens. No issues to report.

The black inks all seem good from Noodlers so I have it.around.too.

Mags sent from my blackberry playbook using tapatalks

Titivillus
May 31st, 2013, 08:53 AM
No issues with Noodlers and they have some colors that I just love. I've pulled back to two ink colors and just use those.

TMac
May 31st, 2013, 11:01 AM
I used to be afraid of the ink because of some of the stories and strong opinions it seemed to bring out in people. In the past year I have acquired 6 different colors. I really enjoy the ink and wish I tried it out earlier. Zhivago has great color but tended to show thru everything but Clairfontaine paper. I added a small amount of water and now can use it on any paper, including the cheap copy paper in the office.

vhr5
June 1st, 2013, 04:40 PM
Lately I have been getting some samples of Noodler's inks and trying them out with some of my pens. If I like a particular color of ink I buy a bottle. So far I have not had any issues with any of the inks, therefore I am still very fond of Noodler's inks. I've tried only one of the eels (Rattler Red), and found it slow to dry on certain papers, therefore causing some smearing if I am not careful.... so I'm careful. As for Baystate Blue, I use it in my Twsbi Vac 700 Clear fountain pen. I thought that it would permanently stain the pen internally, but after I cleaned it with soap and water, most of the staining was removed. The remaining stain, which was very light, was removed with a mild solution of bleach and water. Although I am very fond of BSB and still use it, my new love is Noodler's Liberty's Elysium.

chaimann
June 16th, 2013, 01:35 PM
How many people will have got into the hobby through Noodler's, I wonder?

That would be me. A friend was on the hunt for the perfect black ink, and mentioned that the large bottle of Heart of Darkness came with a free pen. That was my first step on the slippery slope.

The only challenging ink I have used was Kung Te-cheng. It was beautiful, but I can't stand the smell. Even the closed bottle smells bad to me.

urizen2000
August 17th, 2013, 09:16 AM
I like Noodlers. BSB is amongst my faves! But as.folklore goes it stays out.of pens worth over $100. Thus far it has been in and out of several India pens and TWSBI demonstrator....it stains and it is water resistant so clean it off with some bleach and water...voila! the eel inks are easy flowing but.smear and as a leftie they dry SLOW in my ink stained south paw experiences.

I like Plains of Abraham by Noodlers as a sort of bullet proof ink more easily cleaned out.of pens. I used it in a few Aurora pens. No issues to report.

The black inks all seem good from Noodlers so I have it.around.too.

Mags sent from my blackberry playbook using tapatalks

Hi,

I have Blue Upon the Plains of Abraham and wanted to know, do you find that it has a strong chemical smell to it? It surprised me quite a bit. The bottle was recently opened after sitting in a drawer for almost a year, so I don't know if that has something to do with it. But have you used the ink often and noticed that it smells so strongly? Thanks. George

welch
August 21st, 2013, 12:48 AM
There seems to be some prejudice against Noodler's among several pen experts (unidentified).

It maybe that Noodler's is the new kid on the block and more established brands like to take shots at them.

Should I be concerned about using Noodler's?

(1) It is mostly the reverse: Noodlers has a fanatic fan-base that is quick to jump any pen repair people who find themselves requested to repair a tortured feed that last used a Noodlers ink. The insults are often ugly, although Richard Binder seems beyond insult. He's that good. A few restoration experts refuse to warrant their pens if buyers user Noodlers.

(2) Noodlers is not a new ink line. They were an early saturated ink, but nobody connected with the standard brands -- say, Parker Quink or Sheaffer or Perlikan -- have been known to criticize Noodlers.

(3) I dislike some of Noodlers advertising, which attempts to frighten customers into believing that other inks will "flee at the smell of water" or that a fountain-pen user is at risk from forgers and people who eradicate beneficiaries and amounts from stolen checks. This seems unethical: Noodlers frightens people with fake risks and then offers a solution to he fake problem. Many times I read that someone only signs check with Noodlers bulletproof, waterproof, eternal, and fireproof inks. (OK, I made up the "fireproof"...that's hyperbole)

(4) Noodlers seems to have slipshod quality assurance, judging from the number of people who report that Noodlers color X has been reformulated.

I find that:

- Noodlers general inks are safe and some have attractive colors
- Noodlers makes several specialty inks for cold weather, writing during rain storms or sleet storms, or for people who write a page and leave it in in he direct sun. I avoid those inks, because I have no need for he special qualities.
- I grew up using Sheaffer Skrip in the '50s and '60s. Most often, I used Sheaffer Washable Black. I have perfectly readable essays from 1963...they went into a three-ring binder. People in the "golden age" of p;ens managed with what they called permanent ink. Such stuff was hard to get out of your clothes or off your hands, but it could be cleaned. I am more likely to spatter ink on myself when filling than to drop a work notebook into a lake. I like washing the ink out of my clothes.

Fear Noodlers? No. Pick a color you like and use it. Remember to rinse out a pen if you expect to let it sit. Noodlers Baystate Blue is cranky, requiring special handling or you will have a tenacious blue stain on, say, your carpet. Otherwise, use what you like. I know the pen guys who won't warrant their pens for use with Noodlers. They see more pens in a day than we see in a month. Don't ridicule them, but you might have better experience.

dr.grace
August 22nd, 2013, 11:58 AM
But it's essentially true that many inks "flee at the sight of water." I use Noodler's black when I'm addressing an envelope, and I tend to use inks that are at least somewhat water-resistant when writing in my journal or signing documents or writing checks. I've seen the result of coffee or water on things I've written with typical inks that aren't water-resistant, and it wasn't pretty. Oh, actually I guess it might have been pretty in an artistic way, but not readable.

AndyT
August 22nd, 2013, 01:45 PM
On the whole I prefer inks to be washable for the sake of easy pen cleaning, but there's definitely a place for something highly water resistant for addressing envelopes. Iron gall ink of one sort or another in my case, but Noodler's black sounds like a good bet.

velo
August 23rd, 2013, 01:52 AM
Noodler's have very good marketing. Initially I found myself being drawn in by the names of the inks and the labels on their bottles. Now I really make sure to look at the colour and see if its interesting before buying.

AtomicLeo
August 23rd, 2013, 05:45 PM
Lots of great posts here, and I'll add mine.

When I first decided to purchase a fountain pen, I read several sites that recommended Noodler's Black ink. I had not discovered FPN and didn't see any of the negative, over the top claims you'll find. All of these sites recommended Noodler's Black because it was a waterproof ink and many of other fountain pen inks would run on the page just looking at water. I use my pens at work and for journal writing. The water proof capabilities are critical to me. That's what sets Noodler's apart from the rest of the market. Later I found forums like this and was amazed at the vitriol toward the brand. Personally, if a pen restorer tells me that Noodler's voids their guarantee, I'm looking for someone else.

I think much of the negative opinion of Noodler's comes from the owner's personality. He is aggressive and a bit paranoid. I must admit with the heated political climate we have in the U.S. the past decade, I am turned off by anyone attaching a partisan label to their products. I have found myself buying other brands the past few years. That said, I love Noodler's Black Eel, Black, Zhivago, Belted Kingfisher, and Black Swan in English Roses. I've stayed away from the more exotic colors like BSB.

And for what it's worth all my bad ink experiences have been with J Herbin (stuff in the bottle TWICE!), Sailor Apricot (ate and tarnished the metal on a K5 converter), Diamine (The reds all leave 'crud' and Sargasso Sea took FOREVER to clean) and Private Reserve (Black Cherry stained a nib). All brands members here would swear are the best brand ever. Other than Sailor, the reaction with metal spooked me off the brand, I still own other colors in those lines. All a part of the joy of fountain pens!

cwent2
August 23rd, 2013, 07:36 PM
Oh I don't know about aggressive and paranoid - more like that's how "we" are in New England. Alot of us can trace our ancestry to the 1640's and as you can call your brother a jerk but don't let anyone else A swamp Yankee can say the same - Just a little back ground on Swamp Yankee's follows. The Declaration of Independence was signed by the Rhode Island delegation - at gun point - aggressive? Proud is a better term. Paranoid... not without reason.

"Swamp Yankee is a colloquialism that has a variety of meanings. Generally, it refers to Yankees or WASPs (northeasterners with English colonial ancestry) from rural Rhode Island and nearby eastern Connecticut and southeastern Massachusetts. The term "Yankee" connotes urbane industriousness, while the term "Swamp Yankee" signifies a more countrified, stubborn, independent and less refined subtype."

AndyT
August 24th, 2013, 06:36 AM
Nathan Tardif reminds me strongly of an old friend of mine, now deceased. (A Yorkshireman, make of that what you will). He came across as pugnacious, opinionated and defensive on short acquaintance but was a sterling chap underneath it all, so I'm happy to give Nathan the benefit of the doubt. He's 100% wrong about iron gall though! http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys/smiley-basic/wink.gif (http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys.php)

ethernautrix
August 27th, 2013, 02:33 PM
Noodler's Black anyway washes out easily, more easily than other inks (brands, colors). Can't recall which ones stained my hands for a couple of days -- a teal or blue... (not Noodler's).

I used a dip pen to scribble (play!) in my notebook the other night, used Noodler's Apache Sunset. Of course, the ink was very wet and seeped through a couple of pages preceding it. The Sailor Blue-Black has disappeared into or under the NAS; the Noodler's Black - absolutely unmoved, unhidden, no loss of the Noodler's Black.

So there's that....

Penne Stilografiche
August 27th, 2013, 08:59 PM
I own 12 different bottles of Noodler's and I love them all. The only one of them that I have a problem with is Blue Nose Bear, which feathers and bleeds on all types of paper with even the finest of nibs. It is a pretty color, though.

My answer to the OP's question "Should I be concerned about using Noodler's?" is simple, Absolutely not.

Best Regards,
Vincenzo

fncll
August 28th, 2013, 12:18 AM
This forum turned me around about my prejudice against Noodler's ink. Or more accurately my fear. The only one I have had any problems with is polar brown, which feathers like crazy on pretty much every paper I try it on.

david i
August 29th, 2013, 02:06 AM
There seems to be some prejudice against Noodler's among several pen experts (unidentified).

It maybe that Noodler's is the new kid on the block and more established brands like to take shots at them.

Should I be concerned about using Noodler's?

My only thought in all this is that one should not confuse "dislike" for "prejudice".

regards

david

fncll
August 29th, 2013, 09:22 AM
In my experience there's far more prejudice against Noodler's ink than dislike, most based on what I'm now seeing are some ideas that may be true of a few inks but certainly not all.

southpaw52
August 30th, 2013, 04:08 PM
In my experience there's far more prejudice against Noodler's ink than dislike, most based on what I'm now seeing are some ideas that may be true of a few inks but certainly not all.

Very well said and true. There is a prejudice against Noodlers, and many that strongly dislike the ink. If Noodlers was anywhere as bad as some proclaim, the company won't be in business. Do I use Noodlers yes but personally prefer other ink brands first.

radellaf
September 4th, 2013, 02:33 AM
Wow this is a breath of fresh air. I've been avoiding here & FPN in an effort (largely successful) to save money after a layoff, but eventually the unheard episodes of the podcast called to me. Also, google landed me here when I was investigating what happened to Montblanc Lavender (http://fpgeeks.com/forum/showthread.php/2104-Purple-Lavender-Recalled-by-Montblanc) after someone in Ep. 72 said Montblanc Burgundy was discontinued. Burgundy Red was still on their website, but I didn't see Lavender Purple...

So, having come from years of FPN, and seeing this topic raised, I was expecting the worst. After all the red banners, deleted threads, and admonitions by moderators that I "should have run my post by {them} first", how could a forum possibly not implode with flames or lawsuits (from whom I can't imagine)...

But, here's the thread, and it calmly covers all the angles. Cool. FPG, FTW.

I'll add that I have twice had a problem with a Noodler's ink. I have at least 50 bottles and have been using it since the inception ~2005. All other experiences are that the colors are great, but yeah, some feather (Summer Tanager OMG), and some (black) I like better diluted 10-20% with water. I thoroughly clean pens, but I can't claim "good hygeine" as I will leave inks in pens for over a year, only every few months adding distilled water to replace volume lost to evaporation. Which makes some pens, sadly Noodler's own Nib Creaper pens, very hard for me to use as they evaporate close to completely in only a month or two.

So, problems:
1. Basic Bulletproof Black - a bottle from no later than 2006. It would leave a residue after many months in a pen. If you turn over a bottle of black, and within a minute the bottom is still opaque, I'd have concerns. I had a pretty permanent coating on the inside of a TWSBI Vac 700 Smoke. Like, scraping with a Q-tip wouldn't remove the black coating kind of permanent. Ammonia didn't work. Soap did nothing. Isopropyl alcohol took it right off, along with the lube, but in retrospect I should have used the 100 proof Vodka instead. The inside of the barrel is a little fogged now, and with research it seems ethyl is safer than isopropyl for polycarbonate. Or maybe it was the ink not the alcohol, but still, for future reference... I refilled the pen with an 80/20 dilution from a new bottle of black, and after many months there doesn't seem to be any residue. The new bottle also doesn't require more than a little shake for the bottom to become clear enough to shine a flashlight through, whereas the old bottle took a heavy shaking and was never completely clear.

2. Bay State Blue. A bottle from the year it was released. The Cape Cod is still fine (though feathers as bad as Tanager), but the BSB grew little mold colonies on the surface. I filtered it through a coffee filter, which revealed that the glass bottle was "stained". With effort and solvents I cleared it up, but wow was that blue stuck on there. Mold re-grew maybe a year later, and I pitched the bottle. This was about the time some repair guy talked about melted Namiki feeds, of the type used by the Pilot 78G. I have a few, and filled one with the moldy BSB... left it for at least 6 months, and it's fine. Not even really stained. I also got a new bottle of BSB for another 78G, with the same results. No mold grew in either pen, or the new bottle. The new bottle shows no residue clinging to the glass. Nor is the red plastic 78G stained. Feeds are fine. No feeds should be hurt by pH 8-9 ink -- water with a pH of as high as 9 is hard, sure, but still safe drinking water. My old Greg Clark ink sampler says that Sheaffer Black is 9.1 and Pelikan Red 8.8. Platinum Black was the highest at pH 9.9, but the Parker Superchrome inks are in another leage -- listed at pH 12.1 (~160 times stronger). Is there a mystery ingredient in some BSB that has heartburn when combined with a mystery bad batch of plastic used in Lamy or Pilot feeds? Maybe...in theory... but I'm not buying the pH as a cause.

So, as with any ink, if it's moldy or sticking to the bottle, might not be so safe.

Mori45
October 6th, 2013, 09:16 PM
I accidentally left HOD in a pen and although it took weeks to soak it out, but no irreparable damage was done. Some Noodler's inks do leave a film and can stain, but that's hardly unique--Sailor's Kiwaguro inks will do the same in my experience.

Plume145
October 20th, 2013, 05:46 PM
But it's essentially true that many inks "flee at the sight of water." I use Noodler's black when I'm addressing an envelope, and I tend to use inks that are at least somewhat water-resistant when writing in my journal or signing documents or writing checks. I've seen the result of coffee or water on things I've written with typical inks that aren't water-resistant, and it wasn't pretty. Oh, actually I guess it might have been pretty in an artistic way, but not readable.

I address envelopes with whatever's handy/whatever looks pretty, and then buff some Microglaze (http://www.skycraft.com/skycraftMicroGlaze.html) on it. awesome stuff lol.

writingrav
October 20th, 2013, 06:12 PM
But it's essentially true that many inks "flee at the sight of water." I use Noodler's black when I'm addressing an envelope, and I tend to use inks that are at least somewhat water-resistant when writing in my journal or signing documents or writing checks. I've seen the result of coffee or water on things I've written with typical inks that aren't water-resistant, and it wasn't pretty. Oh, actually I guess it might have been pretty in an artistic way, but not readable.

I address envelopes with whatever's handy/whatever looks pretty, and then buff some Microglaze (http://www.skycraft.com/skycraftMicroGlaze.html) on it. awesome stuff lol.

Never heard of the stuff before. It looks like a great idea. Thanks!

cwent2
October 20th, 2013, 06:42 PM
Perhaps, but I just use a piece of Scotch tape over the address and return address on the envelope or use a candle and rub it over the same area. Tape or wax works well for me.

AndyT
October 21st, 2013, 06:04 AM
I address envelopes with whatever's handy/whatever looks pretty, and then buff some Microglaze (http://www.skycraft.com/skycraftMicroGlaze.html) on it. awesome stuff lol.

Excellent. Impoverished graphic designers have been known to use cheap hairspray as a fixative, too.

snedwos
October 21st, 2013, 03:35 PM
Yay candle wax! Been there done that.

Plume145
October 22nd, 2013, 05:48 PM
ugh, I don't know how to multiquote here lol - I thought it would carry over into my reply but it didn't. Anyway!

Microglaze can be a bit of a faff because you need to buff it if you want it to blend into the paper completely. But compared to tape, it doesn't show at all even if you didn't buff it so great. Haven't tried the candle trick because I don't really have any handy lol - only scented candles and they're mostly colored. I rarely use dinner candles so I don't have stubs! lol

The hairspray trick is great, I've used it when I was on holiday and I made something quickly like a greeting card. When you're somewhere a bit off the beaten path you usually can't get fixative, but there's bound to be some chick with a big can of Elnett around, lol. The only thing is it tends to yellow pretty fast apparently - there's no need to go hog-crazy and demand guaranteed 100 year survival or anything, but with hairspray it can take as little as weeks apparently, which is kind of a bummer. Still, great if you do lots of pencil drawings and such that are workups, to be able to handle them at least. And it usually smells better than fixative!

Jim2100
November 8th, 2013, 08:17 PM
Hi,
I just read most of the posts here and finally decided to clean my Lamy Safari that has had BSB in it now for three weeks or so. I have three pens filled with this ink. A Preppy, a Safari and last week I put it in my brand new Vanishing Point. To say that I am or was apprehensive is an understatement.
I cleaned the Safari since it was the first to be filled, before I heard any of the stories about BSB. I had already made some 5% Bleach cleaning solution, just in case. I flushed it with clear water and no more. After several bulbs of water, it ran clear. Then I cleaned the converter thinking that that would be my problem. Nope, none there either. Both cleaned up very well with nothing but water.
Several days ago I took an empty ink vile and filled it with BSB to see if it would stain the plastic. Yep it did. I used the cleaning solution and flushed it a few times, then put some clean solution to rest in it for a few days. And as I looked at it tonight after my cleaning session, it too is perfectly clear. Not stained and the plastic is not foggy.
So I am relieved.

Jim

P.S.
I filled it with Noodler's Antietam.

kaisnowbird
November 8th, 2013, 11:45 PM
I find the plastic of the Lamy converter to be of excellent quality. Most ink never sticks or stains.
However, the edge of its opening is in such a shape that it retains just a little bit of extra ink in there that makes it harder to clean thoroughly.

85AKbN
December 25th, 2013, 11:15 PM
pen hygiene? sink / workplace hygiene. get a small baking or cooking pan from the $0.99 store. use paper cups for flushing, run water when emptying, or better yet, flush the toilet, pour inky water into the whirlpool.

inkstainedruth
December 26th, 2013, 10:00 AM
Some of the best inks (as far as color) I have are Noodler's; and Kung Te Cheng was the first ink that behaved well in my first Konrad -- everything I tried before that was drippy, *including* Iroshihzuku Asa-Gao, which I know a lot of people swear by as "well-behaving". OTOH, the worst ink I ever tried -- La Reine Mauve -- was ALSO Noodler's. Yuck. Nib creep like nobody's business.
I did have issues with sac failure on a couple of vintage pens with (IIRC) Noodler's Manhattan Blue -- so I'm now a bit cautious, but that also could have been the sacs themselves -- I don't know one way or the other. And it didn't *stop* me from buying a backup bottle of Manhattan Blue when I was in NYC over Thanksgiving.
BSB gets its own dedicated pen -- not because of the brand, but because it's very alkaline and the Bay State Series inks do not play well with others (not even other Noodler's inks). And that pen (currently a Noodler's Flex Piston Creaper) is going to have the ink diluted a bit in future because I had bad feathering issues, which I didn't have with the *previous* "BSB only" pen -- a Guanleming 2001 demonstrator, which had a hooded F nib; unfortunately, I snapped the top of the cap off trying to unhook the clip from the elastic band in a pen case (oh well, c'est la vie -- the Guanleming was a $5 pen that *felt* like a $3 pen....). Hmmm. Maybe I should try BSB in the Guanleming Accountant, which does comes across as better than a $5 pen....
YMMV
Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

inkstainedruth
December 26th, 2013, 10:05 AM
I like Noodler's ink. The BSB chases the cat around from time to time, and I had to slap it when it made a pass at my wife, but you know...


:pound:
Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

mhosea
December 26th, 2013, 10:52 AM
Well, as for the alleged misbehaviors of Noodler's Ink, I suspect that Nathan is a victim of his own ingenuity insofar as he ventures out of the realm of tried-and-true and experiments with dyes and other ingredients that are not commonly used. Not all the inks are like this, only some, but over the years he has amassed a catalog of inks with possibly the widest ranging set of performance characteristics and features (not to mention drawbacks) that the fountain pen ink industry has ever seen. When discussing Qin Shi Huang with him as I contemplated buying a bottle at the Boston pen show last June, he told me that no other ink maker was using that dye--"I checked," he said. However, if you drop a drop of Waterman Serenity Blue into a vial of clear household ammonia, it all but disappears. If you drop a drop of QSH in ammonia (without the Waterman drop), it turns to a white cloud (a suspension, I presume). If you drop the Waterman in first and then the QSH, you have just made a dark, sticky precipitate that ammonia won't touch. I was performing my experiment in a sample vial, and the first thing that worked to clean it was isopropyl alcohol. It's not like QSH comes with a warning that you need to 1) flush anything else out of the pen very thoroughly before using it, and 2) should avoid ammonia-based flush when you eventually flush it out very thoroughly.

Another thing he is a victim of, IMHO, is shoddy investigatory work coupled with firmly-established confirmation bias when failures occur. I think it is very likely that unfortunate mixings of ingredients have gummed up some sacs and that concentrated BSB (from dryout) has melted a few feeds out there, and you really needn't try very hard to get flow to stop with almost any highly saturated ink if you let it dry out a bit in the pen (which sometimes happens just because of a poorly-sealing cap), but the confirmation bias vis-a-vis sac failures in general has only made it more difficult to identify which inks and flush ingredients might be involved by tossing irrelevant cases in the mix. The "clogging" issues are, IMHO, overblown, but you should flush highly saturated inks regularly, IMHO, or dilute them at least.

kia
December 26th, 2013, 11:03 AM
Just before going to fountain pens exclusively for my writing efforts, I'd thought little about what ink, and only about where can I find these supposed international cartridges. Then I found the forums, and I discovered bottled ink.

My first bottle of ink was Noodler's Red Black. I liked the color and I liked the idea of permanence on paper (even if just the faint black would remain). I was still writing a lot of checks back then, and check fraud was (and still is to a much lesser extent) a problem. So, trying the Noodler's "bulletproofs" was a no brainer for me. I even put them through the same tests I'd seen others do, and I liked the results. More than anything, though, I wanted permanent inks.

I've never stepped away from Noodler's. I've never bought another brand of ink for my personal use. I have dozens of bottles of Noodler's, some here in the house and some in storage, ranging from the small 1oz bottles up to big 16oz bottles.

I also like that Noodler's is a small business here in the USA, and I like to support the homegrown businesses. I like the value for my money and the full to the brim bottles of ink. I don't always agree with Nathan's opinions for the labels of his inks, but I do like the variety of colors available. I also like the fact that I can call up and actually talk to Nathan while he's making ink! He's interesting to talk with, and his mind is going a mile a minute. I sure as heck hope he's got an apprentice, because I would hate to see Noodler's disappear if something happened to Nathan. I simply like Noodler's Ink.

Of all the Noodler's Ink and colors I have, the only ones I've depleted full bottles of are Fox Red (have gone through several), Legal Lapis (several), Violet Vote, Heart of Darkness, Lexington Gray, and I'm making a fair dent in the volume of my first bottle of 54th Massachusetts.

I like the saturated colors, but yes, some are problematic. La Reign Mauve is the most so, in my experience. Kung Te Cheng has the worst chemical smell ever, but that didn't stop me from buying the remaining four 4oz bottles from Swisher's when it was disappearing from stock. FPN's Galileo has issues now and again, but I love the color and it's bulletproof. Since it is hard to get my hands on it regularly, I bought what I could of the 4oz bottles when it was available, too. BSB, goes without saying anymore, but I love the "pop" of this ink. It's currently in my white tiger Pilot Metropolitan and it's seen a lot of use in the last few weeks. Yep, there is a very faint blue spot on one of the tiger stripes now, but it is from my fingers, not the pen function.

I have let a couple of nibs get badly clogged, but it wasn't the ink's fault, it was mine for not being diligent in my pen cleaning habits. I have found over time that I really should not have any more than three pens inked up at any one time, as I'm likely not to use more regularly. I end up paying for my bad habits, not the pens' or the inks'. I have had no issues when I've regularly cleaned and flushed my pens. Which reminds me that I need to clean out a couple of pens I inked with their proprietary inks just recently just to test them out.

Well, that was a long post just to say I happen to like Noodler's.

:tinfoil3:

dr.grace
December 26th, 2013, 11:22 AM
I did have issues with sac failure on a couple of vintage pens with (IIRC) Noodler's Manhattan Blue -- so I'm now a bit cautious, but that also could have been the sacs themselves -- I don't know one way or the other. And it didn't *stop* me from buying a backup bottle of Manhattan Blue when I was in NYC over Thanksgiving.

I love the color of Noodler's Manhattan Blue, but I had at least two bottles develop SITB, and it clogged up several pens. So I've stopped using Manhattan Blue. (Maybe it also caused premature sac/diaphragm failure in some pens, but I'm not sure about that. As mhosea says, the evidence is only anecdotal, and there's a lot of confirmation bias.) I use some other Noodler's inks routinely, but some are just problematic. I agree with mhosea that Noodler's inks have to be evaluated on a case by case basis.

mhosea
December 26th, 2013, 11:52 AM
I love the color of Noodler's Manhattan Blue, but I had at least two bottles develop SITB, and it clogged up several pens. So I've stopped using Manhattan Blue. (Maybe it also caused premature sac/diaphragm failure in some pens, but I'm not sure about that. As mhosea says, the evidence is only anecdotal, and there's a lot of confirmation bias.)

If anybody wants to add this ink to my long-running latex-sac-fragments-in-sample-vials experiments, feel free to send me a sample, and then I will add it. Not much ink is required, of course! Although if you have sac fragments at your disposal, it might be better if you do it. The thing sort of snowballed on me. Quite generally the disorganization of the thing is an embarrassment to me, but you know I'm not that interested, and I was sort of hoping that there would be a smoking gun early on.

BTW, I decided early on that distilled water wasn't such a good control because after adding the sacs, something might grow in it, so I transferred my "control" samples to Waterman ink a long time ago. The problem is that I am banking on no failures among the controls--they are all in the same vial. This was not smart, but like I said it started simple-minded and small and now involves about a dozen inks. Now that I have phenol at home I should probably go back to the distilled water for the controls, except with phenol added. That will make the controls easier to check at least.

inkstainedruth
December 26th, 2013, 01:15 PM
I love the color of Noodler's Manhattan Blue, but I had at least two bottles develop SITB, and it clogged up several pens. So I've stopped using Manhattan Blue. (Maybe it also caused premature sac/diaphragm failure in some pens, but I'm not sure about that. As mhosea says, the evidence is only anecdotal, and there's a lot of confirmation bias.) I use some other Noodler's inks routinely, but some are just problematic. I agree with mhosea that Noodler's inks have to be evaluated on a case by case basis.

:eek: Thanks for the heads up about the SITB issue -- I will keep a watch out for that. [Grumble grumble -- yet another ink/brand to keep a wary eye on... I've been reading about SITB issues with Herbin inks for the better part of two years.
As for the clogging issue, I have Kung Te Cheng -- so I'm used to that.... :rolleyes: Doesn't stop me from using it. Did make me stop using Diamine Sargasso Sea and Scribal Workshops Leviathan; in the case of Leviathan it was really irritating, because I loved the color -- even better than Noodler's (reformulated) Army Green [I was probably in the very small group that was bummed when Nathan went back to the original formula for that].
Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

shudaizi
December 26th, 2013, 03:05 PM
It does seem odd to single out a single brand and give others a complete pass. I bought Diamine Sargasso Sea before reading reviews -- in part because of a pen expert's site stating categorically that Diamine inks were "low maintenance". Turns out, Sargasso Sea is anything but. My own solution: regular cleaning for all inks / pens and research each individual ink, regardless of brand (or brand reputation). Of course, that means never being an early adopter for a new ink. I can live with that! :D





:eek: Thanks for the heads up about the SITB issue -- I will keep a watch out for that. [Grumble grumble -- yet another ink/brand to keep a wary eye on... I've been reading about SITB issues with Herbin inks for the better part of two years.
As for the clogging issue, I have Kung Te Cheng -- so I'm used to that.... :rolleyes: Doesn't stop me from using it. Did make me stop using Diamine Sargasso Sea and Scribal Workshops Leviathan; in the case of Leviathan it was really irritating, because I loved the color -- even better than Noodler's (reformulated) Army Green [I was probably in the very small group that was bummed when Nathan went back to the original formula for that].
Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

WirsPlm
December 26th, 2013, 03:25 PM
:eek: Thanks for the heads up about the SITB issue -- I will keep a watch out for that. [Grumble grumble -- yet another ink/brand to keep a wary eye on... I've been reading about SITB issues with Herbin inks for the better part of two years.
As for the clogging issue, I have Kung Te Cheng -- so I'm used to that.... :rolleyes: Doesn't stop me from using it. Did make me stop using Diamine Sargasso Sea and Scribal Workshops Leviathan; in the case of Leviathan it was really irritating, because I loved the color -- even better than Noodler's (reformulated) Army Green [I was probably in the very small group that was bummed when Nathan went back to the original formula for that].
Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

You can add surfactants or water to inks to help with the clogging issue, adding some Kodak PhotoFlo to SW Leviathan fixed hard starting and skipping issues for me, although it did make the ink shade less.

Mold and SITB can be very irritating. I think it's more of a problem with brands from the EU or inks made in the EU (due to environmental regulations), but all ink is basically mold food so there's no getting away from it. I got a good-sized bottle of Phenol from Natural Pigments and just add some to all the inks I get for peace of mind.

Honestly, I don't think there's any brand that's perfectly safe or reliable. Bottled ink is a niche luxury product made from natural ingredients, there's going to be significant variation in every single product, and trying to recommend one company or brand over another is huge overgeneralization that does more harm than good. I check up on all the inks I'm interested in, and recommend specific inks instead of entire brands for this reason.

Sham69
December 26th, 2013, 11:27 PM
there is no prejudice against noodlers

it is a conspiracy by older ink manufacturers and pen makers not to let nathan in the game, because his inks are cheaper, superior, newer, and different.

Sham69
December 27th, 2013, 07:18 AM
Directly From Nathan Tardiff For The Reason Of Noodlers And In Its Defence

Soak several “traditional inks” with aluminum foil and tin foil….use some Italian, French, German, and British inks – then soak Noodler’s with aluminum foil….copper foil…brass foil…etc… You’ll quickly see how it is a giant canard that Noodler’s is somehow more corrosive of metals – ESPECIALLY vs. the “tried and true”, “conventional”, “pen company” inks…..(some European inks currently made will eat aluminum foil before your eyes)!!!!!! As for the alloy in South American 51 aluminum pens (mentioned on Zoss recently) – I can’t vouch for what is in their alloy and though I have owned a couple in the past…I was NOT pleased with their performance after weeks of use with ANY ink at that time. They turned out to be a disappointment – especially when one formed a hole in the cone after sitting there for two weeks with plain tap water in it. There are none available to test at this time – but there is aluminum foil as well as the aluminum Kaweco pens – which have had no detrimental effects using Noodler’s (in limited testing….please do not purposely seek out aluminum pens to use with ANY ink in direct contact as it is an inherently unstable metal over time regarding inks in general!). Aluminum foil is readily available…test it in a variety of inks – many will eat it in less than an hour that are currently for sale at your local stationary store as the very same brands being recommended by the self appointed “experts”! Please note: I am not advocating the use of inks in aluminum pens with direct contact to the metal (as with the poorly thought through south American aluminum hooded pens)….just merely pointing out differences in corrosive effects upon aluminum/brass/copper…etc… These are EXTREME tests on corrosion rates – in no way should they be taken as advocating the use of inks with aluminum parts in direct contact (otherwise we would have offered an interesting aluminum ink bottle long ago!). MOST inks and virtually all vintage inks are not stable with aluminum and should not be used nor should they even touch aluminum. Aluminum is not a stabilizing influence over the long term with any inks (including Noodler’s)! An ink that is compatible with the same metals over the LONG term can be made – and if somebody thinks there is demand for it…let me know. As of this time, however…longer term use in direct contact with aluminum parts is strongly discouraged with ANY ink.
I’ll also note how certain of the very same inks that rinse so quickly out of paper do NOT rinse quickly off plastic – test them on plastic sheets for yourself. This has always struck me as idiotic. Ink should be very durable once on paper, and rinse off plastic. Test it on sheet plastic…apply some on plastic from all brands and let it sit in the sun – then spray the sheets with a garden hose. Try sheet rubber as well.

You can cut dye content per volume and make a weaker ink (as well as reducing your cost), as most companies have from the 1970s onward…but it remains the case that weaker inks make fountain pens useless against forgers…let alone simple raindrops when mailing a letter. A certain “establishment ink” once took minutes to rinse off a page with water (approximately 40+ years ago) yet today can be rinsed off at a glance simply running cold tap water over the page. If you want to reduce the utility of the fountain pen to less than that of ball pens/rollers/gels/pencils/felt tips/etc….and you never intend to practice simple maintenance of rinsing out your pen now and then and not repeatedly drying them out without rinsing while on vacation (as one person admits to doing – at least 5 times before even a simple rinse of the mechanism!!) – then use the lowest dye content ink in the most fancy (costly) of bottles recommended by the corporate establishment at their higher margins, or simply use the smallest quantity of food coloring with generous amounts of water to be extra safe beyond even that state of guard against fears….

Some people, on the other hand, will continue to seek added utility – even the greatest level of utility – for the fountain pen beyond a mere colored water writing remnant of a once dominant writing instrument (unfortunately set upon by fear mongers who believe fountain pens can never be durable or of greater utility than other more modern instrument designs – sometimes I believe such individuals don’t even believe a fountain pen should be used at all…just put in a museum to be looked at but not touched or even photographed – as the flash of light might harm the artifact of days gone by!!). Fountain pen ink should outlast the faded ball pen ink we now see before us in archives from the 1960s and 1970s. Fountain pen ink should still be on the page when your grandchildren read what you wrote. Fountain pen ink – and thus fountain pens themselves as writing instruments – should be the preferred means of documenting ideas by hand upon the page. Without vibrant colors, long lasting permanence upon the page, and a wide range of papers to write upon (including moleskin, recycled and other types of legal pads!) – the fountain pen loses the very utility edge that once gave it a majority of pockets. There should be no need to fill landfills with ball pen/roller/gel cartridges when one can use one fountain pen “for all of the above” purposes – provided the ink is available for such uses. The “conventional” naturally sought by the most conservative among us fails to see the true threat posed to the fountain pen that existed only two years ago: the smallest market share of any writing instrument with falling confidence in the durability of the product of that instrument class – the written word it makes upon the page. Is the fountain pen a fragile relic subject to the same fears that any museum curator would tout – or is it a meaningful and durable tool with greater utility than other writing instruments – to be used a great deal in everyday life (even if occasionally rinsed and taken away from the box in the museum humidor)?

79spitfire
December 27th, 2013, 07:30 AM
Tell us how you really feel, don't hold back now!

:pound:

Pterodactylus
December 27th, 2013, 08:41 AM
I don't consider corrosion as a problem somebody has to worry about no matter which ink is used.

I also think that the "ph-neutral" Noodler's slogan is not more than a marketing gag.
I don't have any problem using ink which is not ph-neutral.

E.g. Pelikan 4001 blue-black with ph 2.25 or royal blue 2.75
Pelikan 4001 is THE safe ink since many decades, you can't go wrong with it and it is not ph neutral.

I also have Noodler's inks but I would not use their inks with special properties e.g. Bulletproof.....

Many of their inks are IMO oversaturated (also valid for Private Reserve), means high maintenance and smear, smudge prone.

They have some inks with awesome shading, like Apache Sunset or Golden Brown.
But they do not behave very well on the long run.

Leave Apache Sunset or Golden Brown several weeks sit in a pen and they will become almost unusable.
They will not dry anymore and smudge forever, not even a blotter paper will help (behave like oil on smooth paper).

They also have some great inks, e.g. I love Navy.

There is the suspicion that they may dissolve ink sacks in some cases, but there is no proof (currently).

My personal verdict is they have some amazing shading inks and great colors, but many are not unproblematic.

Jon Szanto
December 27th, 2013, 09:57 AM
Soak several “traditional inks” with aluminum foil and tin foil…

Congratulations on constructing one of the most impressive walls of text I've seen in a while. Assuming you wanted your points to be examined, you might consider a more readable formatting of your messages in the future.

WirsPlm
December 27th, 2013, 10:05 AM
I don't consider corrosion as a problem somebody has to worry about no matter which ink is used.

I also think that the "ph-neutral" Noodler's slogan is not more than a marketing gag.
I don't have any problem using ink which is not ph-neutral.


I don't care about pH neutral inks for pens (given the decades of highly acidic or alkaline inks it can't be a worry anymore), but for writing preservation. Acidic ink, like acidic paper, is a problem for long-term writing and so I avoid it for anything I want to last.

Pterodactylus
December 27th, 2013, 10:44 AM
This is an argument, but I'm not sure if the ink make a difference during our lifetime.

I know that acidic papers got problems with aging on the long run.
Therefor ph neutral paper was introduced that documents or books last longer (every material will be destroyed sooner or later, time destroys everything ;) )

I still have some of my exercise books from the late 70s and early 80s written with Pelikan 4001 Royal Blue which is with 2,75 quite acidic and they still look good (paper and ink)
So personal I have nothing which should (or is worth to) be preserved for centuries. ;)

TSherbs
December 27th, 2013, 02:43 PM
It's always difficult to have an even handed discussion when the thread title leans heavily in one direction.

Prejudice - such a pejorative term.

There are things to like about Noodler's inks, like the immense range of unusual and characterful colours, things not to like - depending on taste, at least - and things to be properly informed about when choosing one of them.

I seem to see a lot of the extreme positions here: either (a) Noodler's killed my budgie! or (b) Anyone who claims Noodler's might damage a pen is a nutjob!

Yes, I'm parodying, but it's not far off some posts in this thread so far.

Prejudice against Noodler's? Not much that I see. Caution, yes, on the part of some. Admiration and hero worship? Yes, some of that too.

This continues to be a fair summary of all that has been written in this thread. Wise.

mhosea
December 27th, 2013, 02:59 PM
I also think that the "ph-neutral" Noodler's slogan is not more than a marketing gag.


I think, rather, that it is neither more nor less than a reflection of Nathan's belief that pH-neutrality is a necessary condition for a "safe" ink. Like you, I disagree with him on this point. I hardly think a man who would produce some of political commentary on ink labels that he does could be considered savvy when it comes to marketing. If he were that, his public image would be toned down a great deal, and liberals would feel less conflicted about liking #41 Brown. :)

Chemyst
December 27th, 2013, 03:21 PM
Soak several “traditional inks” with aluminum foil and tin foil…

Thanks for your post, but I would appreciate it if you proper attributed it. It is a quote and while you may share the feelings, these particular words are not yours.

Sailor Kenshin
December 27th, 2013, 03:49 PM
I don't consider corrosion as a problem somebody has to worry about no matter which ink is used.

I also think that the "ph-neutral" Noodler's slogan is not more than a marketing gag.
I don't have any problem using ink which is not ph-neutral.

E.g. Pelikan 4001 blue-black with ph 2.25 or royal blue 2.75
Pelikan 4001 is THE safe ink since many decades, you can't go wrong with it and it is not ph neutral.

I also have Noodler's inks but I would not use their inks with special properties e.g. Bulletproof.....

Many of their inks are IMO oversaturated (also valid for Private Reserve), means high maintenance and smear, smudge prone.

They have some inks with awesome shading, like Apache Sunset or Golden Brown.
But they do not behave very well on the long run.

Leave Apache Sunset or Golden Brown several weeks sit in a pen and they will become almost unusable.
They will not dry anymore and smudge forever, not even a blotter paper will help (behave like oil on smooth paper).

They also have some great inks, e.g. I love Navy.

There is the suspicion that they may dissolve ink sacks in some cases, but there is no proof (currently).

My personal verdict is they have some amazing shading inks and great colors, but many are not unproblematic.

Now this is interesting.

A while back I was having problems with Navaho Turquoise never drying....behaving as you say like oil. More recently, I had some BSIER in a Wing Sung. It was fine for a few days, and then began acting up, NEVER drying, even on absorbent paper. This is the first time I've heard of a similar problem.

mhosea
December 27th, 2013, 04:19 PM
A while back I was having problems with Navaho Turquoise never drying....behaving as you say like oil. More recently, I had some BSIER in a Wing Sung. It was fine for a few days, and then began acting up, NEVER drying, even on absorbent paper. This is the first time I've heard of a similar problem.

Not to get too far off on a tangent, but most Chinese pens I have seen allow a fair rate of evaporation with the cap on. That might be a factor. Chinese pens often have caps that circulate a lot of air. I have no idea why they design their caps the way they do, except that you might not notice if you were using your pen all day. Depending on the cap design, a drop of shellac sometimes can fix it. I never managed to fix the Wing Sung 322 and 233 to my satisfaction, however, so I eventually tossed them in my parts bin, and there they sit, along with a pair of resin Konrads, which also allow an atrocious rate of evaporation.

Sham69
December 27th, 2013, 05:50 PM
Directly From Nathan Tardiff For The Reason Of Noodlers And In Its Defence

Soak several “traditional inks” with aluminum foil and tin foil….use some Italian, French, German, and British inks – then soak Noodler’s with aluminum foil….copper foil…brass foil…etc… You’ll quickly see how it is a giant canard that Noodler’s is somehow more corrosive of metals – ESPECIALLY vs. the “tried and true”, “conventional”, “pen company” inks…..(some European inks currently made will eat aluminum foil before your eyes)!!!!!! As for the alloy in South American 51 aluminum pens (mentioned on Zoss recently) – I can’t vouch for what is in their alloy and though I have owned a couple in the past…I was NOT pleased with their performance after weeks of use with ANY ink at that time. They turned out to be a disappointment – especially when one formed a hole in the cone after sitting there for two weeks with plain tap water in it. There are none available to test at this time – but there is aluminum foil as well as the aluminum Kaweco pens – which have had no detrimental effects using Noodler’s (in limited testing….please do not purposely seek out aluminum pens to use with ANY ink in direct contact as it is an inherently unstable metal over time regarding inks in general!). Aluminum foil is readily available…test it in a variety of inks – many will eat it in less than an hour that are currently for sale at your local stationary store as the very same brands being recommended by the self appointed “experts”! Please note: I am not advocating the use of inks in aluminum pens with direct contact to the metal (as with the poorly thought through south American aluminum hooded pens)….just merely pointing out differences in corrosive effects upon aluminum/brass/copper…etc… These are EXTREME tests on corrosion rates – in no way should they be taken as advocating the use of inks with aluminum parts in direct contact (otherwise we would have offered an interesting aluminum ink bottle long ago!). MOST inks and virtually all vintage inks are not stable with aluminum and should not be used nor should they even touch aluminum. Aluminum is not a stabilizing influence over the long term with any inks (including Noodler’s)! An ink that is compatible with the same metals over the LONG term can be made – and if somebody thinks there is demand for it…let me know. As of this time, however…longer term use in direct contact with aluminum parts is strongly discouraged with ANY ink.
I’ll also note how certain of the very same inks that rinse so quickly out of paper do NOT rinse quickly off plastic – test them on plastic sheets for yourself. This has always struck me as idiotic. Ink should be very durable once on paper, and rinse off plastic. Test it on sheet plastic…apply some on plastic from all brands and let it sit in the sun – then spray the sheets with a garden hose. Try sheet rubber as well.

You can cut dye content per volume and make a weaker ink (as well as reducing your cost), as most companies have from the 1970s onward…but it remains the case that weaker inks make fountain pens useless against forgers…let alone simple raindrops when mailing a letter. A certain “establishment ink” once took minutes to rinse off a page with water (approximately 40+ years ago) yet today can be rinsed off at a glance simply running cold tap water over the page. If you want to reduce the utility of the fountain pen to less than that of ball pens/rollers/gels/pencils/felt tips/etc….and you never intend to practice simple maintenance of rinsing out your pen now and then and not repeatedly drying them out without rinsing while on vacation (as one person admits to doing – at least 5 times before even a simple rinse of the mechanism!!) – then use the lowest dye content ink in the most fancy (costly) of bottles recommended by the corporate establishment at their higher margins, or simply use the smallest quantity of food coloring with generous amounts of water to be extra safe beyond even that state of guard against fears….

Some people, on the other hand, will continue to seek added utility – even the greatest level of utility – for the fountain pen beyond a mere colored water writing remnant of a once dominant writing instrument (unfortunately set upon by fear mongers who believe fountain pens can never be durable or of greater utility than other more modern instrument designs – sometimes I believe such individuals don’t even believe a fountain pen should be used at all…just put in a museum to be looked at but not touched or even photographed – as the flash of light might harm the artifact of days gone by!!). Fountain pen ink should outlast the faded ball pen ink we now see before us in archives from the 1960s and 1970s. Fountain pen ink should still be on the page when your grandchildren read what you wrote. Fountain pen ink – and thus fountain pens themselves as writing instruments – should be the preferred means of documenting ideas by hand upon the page. Without vibrant colors, long lasting permanence upon the page, and a wide range of papers to write upon (including moleskin, recycled and other types of legal pads!) – the fountain pen loses the very utility edge that once gave it a majority of pockets. There should be no need to fill landfills with ball pen/roller/gel cartridges when one can use one fountain pen “for all of the above” purposes – provided the ink is available for such uses. The “conventional” naturally sought by the most conservative among us fails to see the true threat posed to the fountain pen that existed only two years ago: the smallest market share of any writing instrument with falling confidence in the durability of the product of that instrument class – the written word it makes upon the page. Is the fountain pen a fragile relic subject to the same fears that any museum curator would tout – or is it a meaningful and durable tool with greater utility than other writing instruments – to be used a great deal in everyday life (even if occasionally rinsed and taken away from the box in the museum humidor)?

did not post properly before! i recommend people read this.

Jon Szanto
December 27th, 2013, 05:55 PM
Look up the word verbose in the dictionary, and more often than not you'll see a photo of Nathan Tardiff.

Sham69
December 27th, 2013, 05:59 PM
hahahahhaha, however being verbose is nothing really negative.

Jon Szanto
December 27th, 2013, 06:13 PM
hahahahhaha, however being verbose is nothing really negative.

On the contrary: not being able to succinctly make a point can very frequently turn people off. Early on, I enjoyed watching his videos, but they became more and more gigantic clots of words, meandering for long stretches. As in those very long, dense paragraphs, you can hear people's eyes rolling back in their heads. I believe in quite a bit of what Mr. Tardiff does, and I think the fountain pen community would be a lot less colorful (no pun intended) without his contributions. This in no way excuses long, tiresome rants, or the mixing of politics in with his business.

Sham69
December 27th, 2013, 06:33 PM
Yes this is very true. He is quite eccentric. I to once enjoyed watching his videos but I can no longer spend close to an hour for him to talk about something that should take under 5 minutes.

Pterodactylus
December 28th, 2013, 06:40 AM
Now this is interesting.

A while back I was having problems with Navaho Turquoise never drying....behaving as you say like oil. More recently, I had some BSIER in a Wing Sung. It was fine for a few days, and then began acting up, NEVER drying, even on absorbent paper. This is the first time I've heard of a similar problem.

The behaviour is reproducable.
I have always a lot of pens inked up in parallel, so the pens stay sometimes a long time unused.

Example:
Apache Sunset
When inked up, there is no issue, it shades incredible, behave ok, but when you let it sit unused in your pen for several weeks the following happens:
Paper is Clairefontaine.

I wrote this lines, let it dry for about 10 minutes (but the time does not matter, it will not dry forever)

http://imageshack.us/a/img30/4017/ge2l.jpg

Then ink is sitting like oil on the paper and will not dry anymore.
This become worser and worser with the time until it is completely unusable after several weeks.
Remark: Ink is not almost dried out in the piston, there is a lot of ink left.

http://imageshack.us/a/img534/3364/eipx.jpg

It definitely has something to do with evaporation.
It also happens on quite air tight pens.

My assumption is that not only the evaporation of water is relevant, for me it seems maybe a solvent additionally evaporates which causes the ink to behave like oil.
I only can observe this behaviour with "oversaturated" inks, mainly Noodler´s.
Maybe the ink cannot hold all the dye anymore if some parts are evaporated.
Or a chemical part which is essential for drying is not present anymore.

The only other ink brand where I could observe such bad longtime behaviour is Private Reserve.
You can observe something very similar with Private Reserve Tanzanite (which is also a highly saturated ink).

http://imageshack.us/a/img197/4861/spha.jpg

For me not only the behaviour right after filling a pen is important, for me also the longtime performance is relevant.
The highly saturated Noodler´s inks seems not to be stable on the long run, which is very bad behaviour.
I guess the longtime performance is not only for people like me relevant, who have a lot of pens inked up in parallel, but also for people which use their FP only now and then.

I never observed something similar with traditional ink brands like Pelikan or Rohrer & Klingner.




Here is another Example, ink is Golden Brown, pen is a Montblanc 264 OBB.

The ink was loaded a longer time in the pen.
I wrote the right page, waited about half an hour and turned the page over.
You can see on the left side almost a hardcopy of the writing.

IMO Golden Brown has an additional flaw, it always look different with every load, even with the same pen (used the same bottle).

http://imageshack.us/a/img5/4248/63p8.jpg

Noodler´s has some amazing shading inks (which I love), and the ink world is for sure brighter with their inks, but many of their inks does not really behave very well.

Same is valid for Private reserve, or speaking in general "oversaturated" inks are most of the time prone to smearing and smudging, they often do not behave very well on the long run.

Don´t get me wrong, I love Apache Sunset and Golden Brown, their shading capabilities are stunning, but they are no easy to use well behaving inks.

Noodler´s has also very well behaving inks like e.g. Navy.

Personally I also would not use their Bulletproof inks, I prefer IG inks, there I know what I get. (but this is only a personal decision).

If a Newbie is asking for a well behaving ink, which causes no troubles I would always recommend Pelikan 4001, Rohrer & Klingner or other traditional ink manufacturers but not Noodler´s or Private Reserve.

This has nothing to do with prejudice, or that I don´t like Noodler´s as a brand, it´s just my personal experience.

TSherbs
December 28th, 2013, 08:13 AM
That's very interesting, Ptero. Something to consider. Maybe this is a reason to dilute the saturated inks with a bit of water(?).

kaisnowbird
December 28th, 2013, 08:32 AM
Thank you Pterodactylus, your comments are very helpful.

I've found that my PR Ebony Green never really dries, even when written with a pen that's freshly inked. The level of concentration is just astounding and the smearing is a frequent annoyance. I can dilute it by 100% and still find it very vibrant and intense.

As a result, I only use it (sparingly and always diluted) when I feel like mixing up a little cocktail. One drop of this in a full cartridge will make a big difference.

WirsPlm
December 28th, 2013, 10:38 AM
I've had Apache Sunset in a pen for several weeks (3 or more), and not had issues like Ptero, but I always use absorbent paper, like Ecosystem or Paperblanks (or regular office paper), not super-smooth paper like Clairefontaine. We all know that coatings and super-smooth surfaces can make inks take longer to dry (and that Clairefontaine makes most inks take longer to dry), so I think that plays a significant part in the different results. It's important to make sure ink and paper match, and ink concentration is one of the factors. :)

mhosea
December 28th, 2013, 10:56 AM
Then ink is sitting like oil on the paper and will not dry anymore.
This become worser and worser with the time until it is completely unusable after several weeks.
Remark: Ink is not almost dried out in the piston, there is a lot of ink left.

It definitely has something to do with evaporation.
It also happens on quite air tight pens.

My assumption is that not only the evaporation of water is relevant, for me it seems maybe a solvent additionally evaporates which causes the ink to behave like oil.
I only can observe this behaviour with "oversaturated" inks, mainly Noodler´s.
Maybe the ink cannot hold all the dye anymore if some parts are evaporated.
Or a chemical part which is essential for drying is not present anymore.


Maybe the problem is what doesn't evaporate, e.g. glycerin. These highly saturated inks may have more of both surfactant and glycerin, like drinking both wine and espresso at lunch. You can test whether it's only the loss of water (as opposed to the loss of some other ingredient or something related to oxidation) by dipping the nib in water, saturating the feed, and then seeing whether the resulting diluted ink will dry.

(edited to fix quotation attribution)

85AKbN
December 28th, 2013, 11:04 AM
So this phenomena is limited, reproducable in AS, GB, and PRT?

Sham69
December 28th, 2013, 11:05 AM
What an excellent post thanks very much for sharing, i have not experienced this but i only keep 3 pens inked and tend to have to refill them all every week or so, with my homo sapiens every second day or so. I am going to put some apache in a twsbi and let it sit in the draw for two weeks or so as an experiment. The TWSBI seals very well so it will be interesting to see my result! Ill update you with the result

Sailor Kenshin
December 28th, 2013, 11:16 AM
I've had Apache Sunset in a pen for several weeks (3 or more), and not had issues like Ptero, but I always use absorbent paper, like Ecosystem or Paperblanks (or regular office paper), not super-smooth paper like Clairefontaine. We all know that coatings and super-smooth surfaces can make inks take longer to dry (and that Clairefontaine makes most inks take longer to dry), so I think that plays a significant part in the different results. It's important to make sure ink and paper match, and ink concentration is one of the factors. :)

While this is true, my problems occured when I wrote with NavTurq and BSIER on cheap Chinese journal paper (AKA "paper towel-esque"). And the inks never dried.

Sailor Kenshin
December 28th, 2013, 11:19 AM
[QUOTE=Sailor Kenshin;55730]
Then ink is sitting like oil on the paper and will not dry anymore.
This become worser and worser with the time until it is completely unusable after several weeks.
Remark: Ink is not almost dried out in the piston, there is a lot of ink left.

It definitely has something to do with evaporation.
It also happens on quite air tight pens.

My assumption is that not only the evaporation of water is relevant, for me it seems maybe a solvent additionally evaporates which causes the ink to behave like oil.
I only can observe this behaviour with "oversaturated" inks, mainly Noodler´s.
Maybe the ink cannot hold all the dye anymore if some parts are evaporated.
Or a chemical part which is essential for drying is not present anymore.


Maybe the problem is what doesn't evaporate, e.g. glycerin. These highly saturated inks may have more of both surfactant and glycerin, like drinking both wine and espresso at lunch. You can test whether it's only the loss of water (as opposed to the loss of some other ingredient or something related to oxidation) by dipping the nib in water, saturating the feed, and then seeing whether the resulting diluted ink will dry.

Yah...sorry to double-post. Good point. But this morning I flushed the section only of the pen loaded with NT. Then I slightly diluted the remaining ink in the converter. Smearage was greatly reduced.

What to make of this?

mhosea
December 28th, 2013, 12:08 PM
But this morning I flushed the section only of the pen loaded with NT. Then I slightly diluted the remaining ink in the converter. Smearage was greatly reduced.

What to make of this?

I would have guessed that ink in the chamber was OK but ink in the feed is altered by evaporation or whatever process. When I did some dryout tests with IG and Noodler's inks, I did not see the ink dry in situ. Rather, it seemed to want to wick out into the feed and in some cases onto the nib before it dried, so if evaporation is the issue, then I would expect super duper concentrated ink in the feed, while ink in the chamber might only be marginally more concentrated than normal.

BTW, sorry for the mixed up attributions in the quotes. I trimmed down the post I was responding to and neglected to remove one tag.

Jon Szanto
December 28th, 2013, 12:21 PM
I've either never noticed the topic before, or maybe it hasn't been discussed, but I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who has found certain inks get to a point where they simply won't dry on *any* kind of paper. I believe the only culprits I've had have been Noodler's and Private Reserve inks. I'll go back through my notes to see for sure which I think they were, but the "Ebony..." inks from PR were definitely in this group.

Pterodactylus
December 28th, 2013, 01:00 PM
Good points.

It is not related to the paper, of course it is more visible on Clairefontaine, but it is also there on cheap paper (used now a cheap spiral bound notebook).

http://imageshack.us/a/img9/4471/s82z.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img545/6623/3n6o.jpg


And yes, the ink in the feed seems to be affected more than the ink in the piston, but in my experience also the piston ink is affected.

I will try if the ink dilution will reverse the effect.
My guess is that it will reduce it.

@Sham69
Plan at least 4 weeks test period and leave it completely unused.

@85AKbN
I guess not, but I do not own a big variaty of Noodler´s inks.
Noodler´s inks are hard to get in Europe and quite expensive. ;)

@WirsPlm
3 weeks is on the edge, and did you really didn´t write with your pen during that period?

Cookies
December 28th, 2013, 03:24 PM
Prejudice isn't really the right word in my opinion. Also, I think Noodler's has too many inks to really make any definitive statement on "Noodler's Inks". As a whole though, I have had more problems with Noodler's than any other ink I've used. A brand new sac in my Sheaffer Touchdown turned to goo after a couple weeks with Noodler's inks. Their inks as a whole are pretty poorly behaved, though there are obvious exceptions, and they can also vary wildly between batches. The pens have atrocious quality control as well.
My biggest grievance is with the proprietor though. I find him obtuse and more than a little egotistical and dislike supporting his company. After hearing about how he refused to help his costumer who'd had a severe reaction to his ink it really turned me off of him. I'd rather purchase inks from smaller more personable suppliers like Organics Studio or Scribal workshop that have great rapport with the comment. Or one of the more reliable brands like Diamine or J. Herbin. The same way I would gladly pay a dollar or two more to shop at isellpens, the Andersons, PeytonStretPens, or the Goulets rather than Amazon or ebay. FPR has better choices for low-end "flex" pens as well.
Overall I wouldn't say I have a prejudice against Noodler's, but rather my experiences with the brand have pushed me toward other options.

mhosea
December 28th, 2013, 03:44 PM
A brand new sac in my Sheaffer Touchdown turned to goo after a couple weeks with Noodler's inks.

Please provide us with a list of these inks and any other inks or flush ingredients you may have used with the pen during that time frame. Also, was pure talc used to dust the sac, graphite, or something else? I just want to replicate your results. I'm sure you can appreciate the effect it will have if we can!

Cookies
December 28th, 2013, 04:36 PM
A brand new sac in my Sheaffer Touchdown turned to goo after a couple weeks with Noodler's inks.

Please provide us with a list of these inks and any other inks or flush ingredients you may have used with the pen during that time frame. Also, was pure talc used to dust the sac, graphite, or something else? I just want to replicate your results. I'm sure you can appreciate the effect it will have if we can!

Sorry mhosea, but I didn't attach the sac myself (though I'm going to try and fix it myself for the first time). I can assume it was done to the best standards since I've ordered many restored pens from the same people and they've been top notch. The inks I used were Noodler's Black and either Bad Blue Heron or Kingfisher. Unfortunately I can't remember. I don't use any pen flushes but it was probably flushed with a drop of dish detergent when I first received it. I always use Mrs. Meyer's brand if that helps.
Of course it could just be a bad sac, I'm sure there are a few floating around. But I'm thinking better safe than sorry when it coms to future pens containing sacs.

mhosea
December 28th, 2013, 05:00 PM
Thanks. We've had a couple of people implicate Old Manhattan Blue. I don't tend to put bulletproof inks for Snorkels myself. Bad Blue Heron is one of the harder to clean ones, too, and even the most easily cleaned inks is hard to flush completely from a Snorkel. The sac flushes normally, but nib squirrels away a lot of ink.

Unfortunately, I've had sac fragments in all three of those inks for 8 months at this point with no degradation when I last checked a month or so ago. My only potential result (not a melted sac but just one with some surface degrading) so far has involved BSB and then Bad Blue Heron in succession, but my attempts at replicating that have not yet succeeded. There has been some speculation that other incidental exposures might be involved, hence the question about flush. It's not like anybody thinks the flush by itself is harmful, but the idea is that certain Noodler's Inks plus the flush might do something.

Jon Szanto
December 28th, 2013, 05:05 PM
Hey Mike, have you done any of these sac tests with red inks? I thought I had read or heard that the dye components used for red hues could be a little more harsh on some substances. I had my only "goo sac failure" in a pen that had Black Swan in Australian Roses.

If you haven't done one, I may put together a test with 5 or 6 reds of various manufacturers.

Sailor Kenshin
December 28th, 2013, 05:24 PM
I've either never noticed the topic before, or maybe it hasn't been discussed, but I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who has found certain inks get to a point where they simply won't dry on *any* kind of paper. I believe the only culprits I've had have been Noodler's and Private Reserve inks. I'll go back through my notes to see for sure which I think they were, but the "Ebony..." inks from PR were definitely in this group.

Yah. This also just happened with my new bottle of PR Ebony Blue.

AndyT
December 28th, 2013, 05:32 PM
Very good Pterodactylus. I've noticed the same thing with Zhivago - which came as a surprise because it has a rather different consistency and set of flow characteristics. As you say, it behaves itself with a fresh fill, so presumably it must have something to do with a volatile component. A drying additive would be my guess. I've yet to put Golden Brown in a fountain pen but it runs remarkably well with dip nibs: from what you say that might be the way to get the best from it.

shudaizi
December 28th, 2013, 05:32 PM
I've either never noticed the topic before, or maybe it hasn't been discussed, but I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who has found certain inks get to a point where they simply won't dry on *any* kind of paper. I believe the only culprits I've had have been Noodler's and Private Reserve inks. I'll go back through my notes to see for sure which I think they were, but the "Ebony..." inks from PR were definitely in this group.

Yah. This also just happened with my new bottle of PR Ebony Blue.

I haven't had any refuse to dry ever. But Diamine Sherwood Green on Clairfontaine and Midori papers would stay smearable for a week or longer for me. Not sure why -- it wasn't sitting in my pens unused at all. I gave up on the ink, even though I loved the color. Smearing a week later just isn't practical for me and my uses.

mhosea
December 28th, 2013, 05:33 PM
Hey Mike, have you done any of these sac tests with red inks? I thought I had read or heard that the dye components used for red hues could be a little more harsh on some substances. I had my only "goo sac failure" in a pen that had Black Swan in Australian Roses.


I have sac fragments in Noodler's Nikita, Qin Shi Huang, and in a witches brew of various burgundy inks from remnants of samples that I didn't like, maybe a half a dozen, that includes BSAR. Of course it would be best to test BSAR in unadulterated form, so I encourage you to do so.

What I do is take a sac trimming, divide it in two, and put one half in the ink to test and the other in a "control". As I stated above, I'm using Waterman blue for that, but I plan to go back to distilled water with some phenol added as a preservative.

welch
December 28th, 2013, 08:08 PM
Hi Mike! I think we've discussed this before: inks should be tested by product quality assurance methods, rather than as a scientific experiement. Putting that another way, a sample size of one is not useful when testing a product, which can fail one out of five, or ten, or one hundred times. A single test might pass the product, but it would still be a flawed product.

One of our standing jokes: "let's stop testing while it still works".

I've never had an ink sac fail, but I use far fewer pens than the repair experts see. Also: I like blue, and can't find a business use for red, organge, or green fountain pen ink. If the random failures are connected to red dyes, I wouldn't have seen them.

mhosea
December 28th, 2013, 09:28 PM
Hi Mike! I think we've discussed this before: inks should be tested by product quality assurance methods, rather than as a scientific experiement. Putting that another way, a sample size of one is not useful when testing a product, which can fail one out of five, or ten, or one hundred times. A single test might pass the product, but it would still be a flawed product.


Normally I try to be succinct, and I am about to fail...big time. :) So here's the TLDR version of what follows: People claim that Noodler's Ink melts sacs. The claim is not that a random bottle is defective and that defective bottles melt sacs, rather that this a property of the inks. Therefore, this is not a statistical question about what percentage of bottles of, say, Noodler's Black melts sacs. Scientific experiments are a reasonable way to approach questions about the properties and interactions of substances.

----------------------------

Here's the problem. If you say "Noodler's Ink melts latex sacs" it is a scientifically testable statement. People can believe whatever they want, but they say that not because they know it for any valid reason, rather because they are human, and humans have evolved to draw such conclusions at the drop of a hat. "Ork ate the red berries and he died, therefore red berries kill people. Don't eat the red berries." It's a good instinct for the survival of the species but not so good for getting at the truth because coincidences occur. Maybe Ork's stomach ulcer finally perforated and that was the end of him. We don't really know. Unfortunately, Ork's comrades probably don't know how to perform an autopsy, or they might be able to say, "Look here, that's a perforated ulcer--that's what made him sick, maybe not the berries." Of course with the kind of logic we see applied to Noodler's Ink, it would go more like "Look here, that's a perforated ulcer. Red berries kill people by melting their stomachs!"

Part of my frustration with the issue is that every failure is a missed opportunity to perform an autopsy of sorts. Even if a sac melts there may be a relatively untouched portion of it on the sac nipple, protected by the shellac. If there isn't, then that's a solid clue that shouldn't be so easily glossed over because this area is protected from exposure to the ink (until the sac fails). If there is, we could take this fragment and expose some of it to the exact ink(s) that supposedly melted it and expose part of it to a known-safe control, then we might see that yes, indeed, that ink melts that sac and the control liquid does not. Or we might see both melt or neither. If it is both, why should we blame the ink? If it is neither, then we have to face the fact that our theory that the ink melts sacs is at the very least incomplete and may be incorrect. Instead, though, the sac remnants go in the trash, and the ink goes down the drain, and the proclamation is made that ink melted the sac. That's the perfect way to preserve the status quo, and the status quo is, unfortunately, ignorance. We know almost nothing about what's going on, and it's likely to stay that way unless people start making at least some small efforts when they get the opportunity.

In this case we also have evidence that is often overlooked. If Ork and his brother Indy both the berries and Indy did just fine, then they might not be blaming the berries so quickly. If they all ate the berries and only Ork died, then they probably would have ruled out the berries as the cause to begin with. Apparently this doesn't work with fountain pens. For some reason it seems to be irrelevant that hundreds, if not thousands, of people using Noodler's inks in vintage pens don't experience failures.

That ought to be a head-scratcher. How do we explain that? By what physical mechanism might Noodler's inks can randomly or occasionally melt sacs? For example, by what mechanism is one bottle of Noodler's Black safe for latex and another not? We expect a slight variation in concentration of the various ingredients and perhaps trace amounts of contaminants, but AFAIK, there is no scientific basis for expecting this to have such a dramatic effect. Why should a little more glycerin or a little less biocide change the ink from something safe with latex to something very hostile to it? Melting latex, after all, is not all that difficult. The wood stain I used a couple of weeks ago on my ink vial block would do it, but I guarantee you that it would do it every time. Grab a 100 cans off the shelf and 100 cans will be "defective" in that way, and none of them will take an hour to do it, much less two years.

So what is going on? It is possible that there is a decomposition of some sort. I know, for example, that antibiotics in the tetracycline class become toxic when they get old. But I know of no correlation between the ages of the bottles and the sac melting phenomenon. Perhaps it is, as some surmise, a random combination. Inks do react sometimes when they are mixed, and it is possible that a byproduct of the reaction might be hostile to latex. Perhaps a cleaning/flushing ingredient is invovled somehow. If it is a combination of ingredients, then there is a chance that by paying attention and asking questions after failures occur we might develop a short list of suspects. Once we figure out what the ingredients are, we should be able to make this happen every time, not just 1 out of a 100. I have no way of investigating this, and I doubt it would be detected by QC efforts, either.

Richard Binder surmises, and I think it is reasonable to do so, that only certain Noodler's Inks are involved. Not that a randomly bad bottle of them melts latex, but that these particular inks, whichever they might be, are inherently problematic. It is this possibility that I mean to address because it is this claim that people are making. At the very least if one claims that it wasn't a bad sac (always with no evidence to that effect, BTW) and that this ink melted the sac in short order, then we at least have to face the reality that we have chemistry mystery to solve before our theory works.

Simon Pen-Pusher
December 28th, 2013, 10:14 PM
No, that is not actually the case. There are very real concerns that any fountain pen user should become very familiar with - especially as the range of "exotic" inks rapidly grows.

Like you I have wondered about "overly critical" statements. But in general there are very good reasons for suggesting care to the unwary. It is plainly logical that adding to inks new chemistry to help achieve what has not been previously possible - colours and robustness - may have short to long term adverse effects. Some effects will be harmless and just a nuisance. But others may very well be harmful.

With about 35 years fountain pen experience and owning a very wide range of fountain pens - brands, types and price categories from budget to high value limited edition pens, I have been a big fan of Noodler's inks. I love the colour range in particular. But in the last couple of years as I expanded my range of colours by Noodler's, I started to experience real problems with ink-flow in particular.

3 of my all-time favourite inks are Noodler's - Blue, Red and Saguaro Wine. These are excellent inks in every respect.

But, for example 2 other favourites very quickly caused big problems of ink-flow (no damage at all) with 2 of my best ink-flow daily use pens. I did my own investigation and tests. The result was the presence of substantial amounts of sediment in the inks - e.g. Polar Brown and Black.

I've also done comparative tests which had the opposite behaviour and had no sediment present. I posted a short essay about this "Be careful about exotic inks" on my website: www.fountainpenbiz.com

The issue is not just about Noodler's - it is equally about any ink supplier that is promoting:
1. very exotic colours;
2. unusually robust ink such as "bullet proof" attributes.

Fountain pen ink is and always has been WATER based for very good reasons. New additives that enhance colours and robustness risk adding undesirable content that can interfere with both the delicate feed mechanism as well as the internal components. Like our own bodies and cars, take care with what you feed them.

There are similar reports that Diamine Registrars will badly stain nibs. I have tested that - it does. So, because I love that ink I use it with a black nib!

There are other reports about damage by "exotic"/robust inks to internal components. These claims are very plausible. DO YOU KNOW THE EXACT CHEMISTRY OF YOUR INK? A chemist will tell you (when you identify the ingredients) how those ingredients can damage a pen's components.

I am NOT a blind advocate of pen brand inks (my favourite range is Diamine). But there is one assurance involved in using pen maker inks, you can be more sure that they will not adversely affect internal components - for obvious reasons.

So, I suggest we all take care and demand full disclosure of the ink chemistry (as we do with foods etc) so that we can judge the potential for any adverse effects - harmless and harmful. And since I ran into a lot of ink-flow bother with Noodler's Polar Brown and others, I am now cautious and pre-test. I've never had a similar problem since.

I hope I have helped.
Simon.

Sham69
December 28th, 2013, 10:20 PM
10/10 post thanks for taking the time to write that, my thoughts exactly expressed in an intelligent and easy way to understand!

whych
December 29th, 2013, 06:00 AM
Here's the problem. If you say "Noodler's Ink melts latex sacs" it is a scientifically testable statement.
I thought that the ink sac part was also down to a batch of sacs that were substandard.
Since the pens were sacced by different people it was not possible to identify whether they came from the same batch of sacs.

I think you need a bit of common sense here: many inks from various manufacturers are highly saturated and will stain almost any pen. If that is the case, don't use the ink in a pen that you want kept in pristine condition.
I have used Diamine inks that are difficult to clean out of a pen and will stain just as badly as Noodlers BSB. Only difference is that Diamine doesn't have the reputation of destroying ink sacs.
I have used Noodlers 41 brown in an old Sheaffer TD with no ill effects, other than it took me ages to clean the ink out of the pen.

Iron gall inks are meant to be bad for pens, but of the number of German pens I have bought that had been left for years with the old Pelikan blue black in them, very few had the nibs destroyed.

mhosea
December 29th, 2013, 12:10 PM
There was a bad batch, but I think it was quite a long time ago, and those sacs failed very quickly. The consensus among restorers is that these sacs are no longer at issue. I think there are potentially some different kinds of failures:

1. Bad sac: typically a failure of the latex metal inhibitor.
2. Bulb-filler failure: breakdown of latex from external environmental exposures.
3. Ink-misbehavior (misdemeanor): "gumminess" from ink residue or precipitate, perhaps from inadvertent mixing.
4. Ink-misbehavior (felony): melting due to ink exposure.

I think #3 might be getting more and more common and might be mistaken for an early stage of #4.

dr.grace
December 29th, 2013, 12:44 PM
Mike, I'm a scientist by profession, so of course I like experiments. I applaud your desire to do them! The difficulty is that they have to be designed properly to give a meaningful answer. Unfortunately, with latex bits suspended in vials of ink, it's difficult to replicate the conditions found in fountain pens during use (or abuse.) Normally there is some degree of evaporation, which results in concentrated ink and precipitation when the solutes become saturated. Also, as you say, it's possible that different ink remnants become mixed inadvertently. There are many variables that are difficult to control. Also, it sounds like you're using a single observation for each condition. Normally, in scientific experiments, you have to repeat them two or three times, at least, to be confident of the reproducibility.

What you might be able to decide, using your approach, is whether inks in the state supplied by the manufacturer are sufficient to melt latex bits. I suspect you'd find that the inks at their factory-supplied concentrations will have no effect at all on the latex. (That's what Nathan Tardif implied, when he reported that his inks had no effect on the latex tubes used to dispense them in his factory.) If that's what you indeed end up observing in your tests, you could then conclude that gooey sacs would have to result from some other event, perhaps concentration, precipitation, and/or inadvertent ink mixing.

mhosea
December 29th, 2013, 01:15 PM
Also, it sounds like you're using a single observation for each condition. Normally, in scientific experiments, you have to repeat them two or three times, at least, to be confident of the reproducibility.


I completely agree with everything you wrote. However, it is likely that my vigorous defense of doing experiments at all has led you to overestimate my opinion of them, or my plans on how to interpret negative or positive result. In fact, I am keenly aware of the limitations. My plan vis-a-vis this point you make above was to use initial results as a guide to further investigation only. That is to say, if I note anything suspicious, I would go from there. If I can repeat it, I will do it again and also invite you (generic "you") to do it as well. Then we can interpret it together.

If I never generate anything but negative results, I think you will find that I will not over-interpret that as proof of anything, though I do think it should be taken account of when formulating the simplest explanation of a given failure (Occam's Razor). If these inks never seem to melt latex when we are looking, perhaps the policy of making ink the defacto explanation, ignoring the possibility of latex anomalies, should be questioned.

Addendum: You do give me an idea for another experimental approach. I could start doing a repeated-dryout exposure, i.e. put a fragment in a vial, put a small amount of ink in, let it evaporate, then repeat (lather, rinse, repeat? Probably). This might make a difference in some cases. The way we have seen some reports of BSB melting feeds, I suspect it becomes more caustic at higher concentrations. Other inks may also see their chemistry change.

Cookies
December 29th, 2013, 01:37 PM
In response to a few comments that mentioned it was reputation that was the driving idea behind Noodle's melting sacs. To be fair, I had no idea Noodler's had any reputation for melting ink sacs. I simply had a pen that had just been been fitted with a brand new sac and after using it with only two inks, both Noodler's, I noticed it was only holding a drop of ink when I filled. When I opened it up the sac was... goo for lack of a better term. Despite the fact that I try to flush as throughly as possible there's always the chance (especially with Touchdown fillers which I find difficult to flush) that there was a bit of Noodler's Black left in the pen when I filled it the second time.

dr.grace
December 29th, 2013, 01:53 PM
Also, it sounds like you're using a single observation for each condition. Normally, in scientific experiments, you have to repeat them two or three times, at least, to be confident of the reproducibility.


I completely agree with everything you wrote. However, it is likely that my vigorous defense of doing experiments at all has lead you to overestimate my opinion of them, or my plans on how to interpret negative or positive result. In fact, I am keenly aware of the limitations. My plan vis-a-vis this point you make above was to use initial results as a guide to further investigation only. That is to say, if I note anything suspicious, I would go from there. If I can repeat it, I will do it again and also invite you (generic "you") to do it as well. Then we can interpret it together.

If I never generate anything but negative results, I think you will find that I will not over-interpret that as proof of anything, though I do think it should be taken account of when formulating the simplest explanation of a given failure (Occam's Razor). If these inks never seem to melt latex when we are looking, perhaps the policy of making ink the defacto explanation, ignoring the possibility of latex anomalies, should be questioned.

Addendum: You do give me an idea for another experimental approach. I could start doing a repeated-dryout exposure, i.e. put a fragment in a vial, put a small amount of ink in, let it evaporate, then repeat (lather, rinse, repeat? Probably). This might make a difference in some cases. The way we have seen some reports of BSB melting feeds, I suspect it becomes more caustic at higher concentrations. Other inks may also see their chemistry change.

Perfectly reasonable!

Chemyst
December 29th, 2013, 01:55 PM
Of course most of these ink-pen interaction problems were obviated back in 2010 with the importation of specially modified and hardened pens for use with Noodler's Ink (http://www.gouletpens.com/Noodlers_Pens_s/809.htm). You can use any color you desire without hunting down an ebonite feed, modifying the tines or worrying about damage to latex sacs or any other component. A wide range of colours and designs are available. They are also user modifiable and easily disassembled for thorough cleaning. If you haven't yet, do take a look!

inkstainedruth
December 29th, 2013, 01:56 PM
You and dr.grace both make very good points. In particular, I'm now starting to wonder whether there was some sort of negative interaction between the ink (in my case Manhattan Blue) and whatever ink was in the pens before I acquired them. The pens in question are a Parker 51 Aerometric and a Parker 21. I have no idea what ink was in the pens previously -- and in the case of the 21, there was definitely something in it when I bought it -- I wrote a couple of pages of notes about the pen just with whatever had been in it, diluted with distilled water as an initial flush. And in point of fact, before I bought it (which was about 10 months ago in an antiques mall) I had the guy opening the case for me take the cap off because the dried ink had leaked enough that the cap was stuck; I wanted him to do it, not me, simply for fear of breaking something. And 51s and their less expensive cousins are also moderately hard to fully clean (especially if you're like me, and somewhat OCD about getting every molecule of ink out of the pen when flushing, and also don't have a ultrasonic cleaner -- and that of course would also involve disassembling the pen, which is something currently beyond my comfort zone to do myself).
The 51 has since been resacked, and I'm being a little more wary about what inks I put in it (currently Herbin Eclat de Saphir) and in my other 51s. Not sure whether the 21 will also need to have a new sac installed in it (it's currently out of rotation. I would really hate the problem to be the Manhattan Blue, because it's a gorgeous color -- I liked it so well I bought a backup bottle when I was in NYC over Thanksgiving.
As for ptero's comments about the slower dry/smuge times, the only inks I've personally run across that with have been Private Reserve -- DC Super Show Blue and DC Electric Blue. OTOH, I had Noodler's Bulletproof Black in a Platinum Preppy set up as a rollerball for literally several *months* and had no issues with the ink at all. Well behaved up to the very end.
YMMV
Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

RudyR
December 29th, 2013, 03:05 PM
Why I don't buy Noodlers anymore:

Lots of feathering from the inks I bought

Nib creep so bad that it looks like the pen was used to slay something

Warden series is such a PITA to clean out properly

As stated in the thread somewhere above, Noodlers will have variations of the same ink throughout its production while I prefer a stable formula I can depend on

I have never thrown away a bottle of ink except for one, the highly praised Noodlers Black. It had turned from black to a vile light tarry color in 3 years of owning the bottle. No amount of shaking turned it black again

That's it for me.

dr.grace
December 29th, 2013, 05:11 PM
Of course most of these ink-pen interaction problems were obviated back in 2010 with the importation of specially modified and hardened pens for use with Noodler's Ink (http://www.gouletpens.com/Noodlers_Pens_s/809.htm). You can use any color you desire without hunting down an ebonite feed, modifying the tines or worrying about damage to latex sacs or any other component. A wide range of colours and designs are available. They are also user modifiable and easily disassembled for thorough cleaning. If you haven't yet, do take a look!

Well, OK, but I for one don't like the Noodler's pens because IME they tend to dry out quickly and have QC problems. Unless you are particularly fond of the steel flex nibs, I could say that there are a lot of pens that are more enjoyable to look at and to write with, even if they have occasional problems. Then, there are also some, like the Pilot Custom 74 and 823, the Pelikan Souveran models, the Parker 51, etc. etc. that are extremely reliable and also fun to use. I don't want to be limited to the Noodler's pens when there's a whole universe of pens out there that can still handle "interesting" inks.

mhosea
December 30th, 2013, 12:02 AM
Well, OK, but I for one don't like the Noodler's pens because IME they tend to dry out quickly and have QC problems. Unless you are particularly fond of the steel flex nibs, I could say that there are a lot of pens that are more enjoyable to look at and to write with, even if they have occasional problems.

It is possible to have a little of both worlds.

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2806/10621312743_f88a45603a.jpg (http://www.flickr.com/photos/85717572@N05/10621312743/)

With the Triumph nib and feed, the Ebonite Konrad doesn't have a dryout problem. I have been thinking about trying an acrylic Konrad and doing the same thing, but I worry that it might have the same dry-out issue as the regular resin Konrads, which I could not tolerate.

WirsPlm
December 30th, 2013, 11:51 AM
In response to a few comments that mentioned it was reputation that was the driving idea behind Noodle's melting sacs. To be fair, I had no idea Noodler's had any reputation for melting ink sacs. I simply had a pen that had just been been fitted with a brand new sac and after using it with only two inks, both Noodler's, I noticed it was only holding a drop of ink when I filled. When I opened it up the sac was... goo for lack of a better term. Despite the fact that I try to flush as throughly as possible there's always the chance (especially with Touchdown fillers which I find difficult to flush) that there was a bit of Noodler's Black left in the pen when I filled it the second time.

Have you reported it to the pen seller you got the sac from? Some time ago, a whole batch of sacs was badly manufactured and these sacs will melt easily just from being exposed to ink. They were made some time ago, but some are still around due to slow throughput (FP sacs aren't a high volume product, to say the least), and crop up every now and again.

I've mixed Noodler's black with other Noodler's inks and with ink from another brand and not had any problems, and so have others, so it's likely that the sac was at least part of the problem. So frustrating, and we're probably never going to figure out the chemistry behind these things.

Pterodactylus
December 30th, 2013, 12:00 PM
Who manufactured this bad badge of sacs?

79spitfire
December 30th, 2013, 12:41 PM
Some of the sacs came from Woodbin in Canada, and (as I understand it) the Pen Sac co.

I also understand that is was over 10 years ago at this point.

One assumption to all of this is that latex is a perfect material and it cannot fail. That coupled with some pen restorers putting Noodler's on their troublesome inks list and the fact that many don't like Nathan's vocal political points of view has brewed a situation where Noodler's inks are becoming a target. I have had sacs fail when using other inks. My personal conclusion is that in every batch of latex rubber (a natural material, it comes from tropical trees) their will be variances that cannot be accounted for. The sacs that should be tested are the ones that failed, but those aren't available.

Lets be honest with ourselves, guys, when we were young and in school, we were warned about 'failing prophylactics'.... Guess what those are made from...

Cookies
December 30th, 2013, 05:25 PM
In response to a few comments that mentioned it was reputation that was the driving idea behind Noodle's melting sacs. To be fair, I had no idea Noodler's had any reputation for melting ink sacs. I simply had a pen that had just been been fitted with a brand new sac and after using it with only two inks, both Noodler's, I noticed it was only holding a drop of ink when I filled. When I opened it up the sac was... goo for lack of a better term. Despite the fact that I try to flush as throughly as possible there's always the chance (especially with Touchdown fillers which I find difficult to flush) that there was a bit of Noodler's Black left in the pen when I filled it the second time.

Have you reported it to the pen seller you got the sac from? Some time ago, a whole batch of sacs was badly manufactured and these sacs will melt easily just from being exposed to ink. They were made some time ago, but some are still around due to slow throughput (FP sacs aren't a high volume product, to say the least), and crop up every now and again.

I've mixed Noodler's black with other Noodler's inks and with ink from another brand and not had any problems, and so have others, so it's likely that the sac was at least part of the problem. So frustrating, and we're probably never going to figure out the chemistry behind these things.

I didn't tell them about it since I decided I'd like to try replacing it myself. It's definitely possible it could have been an old stock sac. Though they do quite a few refurbishments so I'm sure they go through stock petty quickly.

raging.dragon
January 3rd, 2014, 08:58 PM
A brand new sac in my Sheaffer Touchdown turned to goo after a couple weeks with Noodler's inks.

Please provide us with a list of these inks and any other inks or flush ingredients you may have used with the pen during that time frame. Also, was pure talc used to dust the sac, graphite, or something else? I just want to replicate your results. I'm sure you can appreciate the effect it will have if we can!

Sorry mhosea, but I didn't attach the sac myself (though I'm going to try and fix it myself for the first time). I can assume it was done to the best standards since I've ordered many restored pens from the same people and they've been top notch. The inks I used were Noodler's Black and either Bad Blue Heron or Kingfisher. Unfortunately I can't remember. I don't use any pen flushes but it was probably flushed with a drop of dish detergent when I first received it. I always use Mrs. Meyer's brand if that helps.
Of course it could just be a bad sac, I'm sure there are a few floating around. But I'm thinking better safe than sorry when it coms to future pens containing sacs.

Is the dish detergent coloured and/or scented? It could be something in the detergent that killed the sac.

Cookies
January 4th, 2014, 12:32 PM
Scented. I use it on all my pens though, including those with sacs and it's a very mild detergent. It's possible, of course, but I think heavily diluted dish detergent is generally fine for use in pens.

mhosea
January 4th, 2014, 02:08 PM
I switched from dish soap to Kodak Photo-Flo several months ago to avoid the unknowns of dish soap, but OTOH, I would be mildly surprised if heavily diluted dish soap did anything major to latex. For one thing, latex gloves are commonly used when washing dishes, so such a product would be problematic even for its stated purpose.

Cookies
January 4th, 2014, 03:18 PM
I'm a film photographer so I actually have a stock of Photo-Flo around the house. But it's so difficult to just get one or two drops out because it has such a large mouth so I just stick to dish soap. I actually know a few photographers who will use dish soap in place of Photo-Flo as it is now increasing difficult to find. If it doesn't harm the emulsion on film, I'm pretty sure it'd be okay for a latex sac. I think if dish soap were the culprit we'd be hearing about more sac failures as it seems to be something most of us do with our new pens.

mhosea
January 4th, 2014, 04:25 PM
Yup. My solution was to buy some dropper bottles. I bought four dropper bottles from specialtybottle.com, 2 amber, 2 cobalt blue. One has Photo-Flo in it, another has Phenol, another has distilled water with a little bit of phenol (for ink dilution), and another has isopropyl alcohol.

Cookies
January 8th, 2014, 01:15 PM
That's one of those "why didn't I think of that" ideas. I am definitely stealing that.

pengeezer
January 11th, 2014, 04:42 PM
Any ink that ruins pens is not an ink suitable for fountain pens and shouldn't be advertised as such, in my opinion. I tried Ottoman Azure...it was a nice color, but stained by hands badly.

Sorry to hear that--that's my favorite Noodler's color!


John

southpaw52
January 23rd, 2014, 03:35 PM
If Noodlers ink is so problematic, then how does the product stay on the market. If it has so many issues, then nobody would be buying it. In essence the company would be out of business if the product was as bad as it has been reported.

All ink brands can pose problems if proper pen hygiene is not followed. Is Noodlers worse than others doubtful.

mhphoto
January 26th, 2014, 11:23 PM
If Noodlers ink is so problematic, then how does the product stay on the market. If it has so many issues, then nobody would be buying it. In essence the company would be out of business if the product was as bad as it has been reported.

All ink brands can pose problems if proper pen hygiene is not followed. Is Noodlers worse than others doubtful.

:thumb:

Jon Szanto
January 26th, 2014, 11:50 PM
1. If Noodlers ink is so problematic, then how does the product stay on the market.
2. If it has so many issues, then nobody would be buying it.
3. All ink brands can pose problems if proper pen hygiene is not followed.

Well, if you want to look at "Noodlers" as a monolithic situation, fine. Make statements like the above. However, the reality lies more in the fact that Nathan Tardiff makes a very large line of inks, and they are not all the same. In fact, he makes that a selling point. So...

1. It isn't ONE thing. It is many things. Some have problems, most do not.
2. No, people buy a lot of the inks that have no problems. And some people buy inks that screw with their pens and complain about it, but there are enough n00bs and people who don't frequent pen forums that they step into the gap. Still, the majority of his inks sell because they are good inks.
3. Many of the problems with the problematic inks in the Noodlers line have nothing to do with bad pen hygiene, so that response doesn't even count.

Nate's got lots of good inks, a a couple are go-tos for me. He also has some bad one, and I avoid those. He also has quality control issues from time to time which many not make the ink bad, but vary enough from batch to batch that is isn't so swell.

I like using some of his inks. Nothing in their use, however, causes me to stick my head in the sand, or lose perspective.

AndyT
January 27th, 2014, 08:48 AM
Spot on in every particular, Jon.

mhosea
January 27th, 2014, 09:56 AM
It is only my perception, perhaps, but any "prejudice" against Noodler's is based more on fear of pen damage than on performance factors. Some Noodler's Inks have dreadful performance characteristics, and people who use a lot of Noodler's Inks tend to know all about that. I wouldn't use the word "prejudice", however, and if we separate the issues

1. clogging (or at least flow stoppage)
2. feed melting (BSB only, apparently)
3. staining
4. latex (and supposedly even PVC) sac melting

the quality of bases for holding a negative opinion varies a lot. Strictly speaking, #1 does not damage the pen. I am at a loss to explain why it is so often treated as a "safety" issue. I put it with the performance characteristics that might lead me to favor another ink.

raging.dragon
February 5th, 2014, 08:15 PM
It is only my perception, perhaps, but any "prejudice" against Noodler's is based more on fear of pen damage than on performance factors. Some Noodler's Inks have dreadful performance characteristics, and people who use a lot of Noodler's Inks tend to know all about that. I wouldn't use the word "prejudice", however, and if we separate the issues

1. clogging (or at least flow stoppage)
2. feed melting (BSB only, apparently)
3. staining
4. latex (and supposedly even PVC) sac melting

the quality of bases for holding a negative opinion varies a lot. Strictly speaking, #1 does not damage the pen. I am at a loss to explain why it is so often treated as a "safety" issue. I put it with the performance characteristics that might lead me to favor another ink.



I can see why this would annoy pen repair people - ink prone to prone to clogging leads to warranty claims and angry customers unreasonably blaming the repair person.
The only plausible mechanism for this is highly basic inks, like Noodler's Baystate series and the old Parker Superchrome.
Except for the infamous Baystate inks, Noodler's inks seem less prone to staining than many other brands.
It is inevitable that some fraction of sacs will be defective due to imperfect mixing and I've yet to see any evidence that this caused by inks. Plausible mechanisms would be highly basic inks (again) and organo-metallic dyes (metal ions can break down latex).

mhosea
February 5th, 2014, 09:03 PM
It is inevitable that some fraction of sacs will be defective due to imperfect mixing and I've yet to see any evidence that this caused by inks. Plausible mechanisms would be highly basic inks (again) and organo-metallic dyes (metal ions can break down latex).


Yes, although I just had an unsettling experience. Awhile back I initiated an experiment where I put sac fragments in ink in an open container to let the ink evaporate and concentrate. I just checked on that experiment. I didn't do this with that many inks, just BSB, Noodler's Black, Bad Blue Heron, #41 Brown, and North African Violets. I checked all. I couldn't find the sac fragment in Noodler's Black. I thought I saw it, but when I tried to fish it out, it was gone. Did I forget to put it in there? Did I miss when I was dropping it in? Was I seeing things? Did it melt? Hmmm. The one in the sealed vial of Noodler's Black still looks great. I restarted that dryout experiment. There's definitely a fragment in there now. We'll see. As for the fragment in BSB, it looked great, as did the others. Actually, the control fragments in Waterman Blue looked worse, though only kind of bleached in appearance with no other concerning artifact.

fncll
February 5th, 2014, 09:07 PM
The market argument isn't necessarily a sound parallel. Consider various sports cars which are great performers but also notorious when it comes to maintenance needs and repair costs. They remain on the market and are often quite expensive...but the users accept those costs for the performance. Given some recent experiences with a couple of inks, I think a few Noodler's inks probably fit in this category. But they're not the only ones and I don't plan to stop using any of them unless I don't like the color!

raging.dragon
February 5th, 2014, 09:23 PM
It is inevitable that some fraction of sacs will be defective due to imperfect mixing and I've yet to see any evidence that this caused by inks. Plausible mechanisms would be highly basic inks (again) and organo-metallic dyes (metal ions can break down latex).


Yes, although I just had an unsettling experience. Awhile back I initiated an experiment where I put sac fragments in ink in an open container to let the ink evaporate and concentrate. I just checked on that experiment. I didn't do this with that many inks, just BSB, Noodler's Black, Bad Blue Heron, #41 Brown, and North African Violets. I checked all. I couldn't find the sac fragment in Noodler's Black. I thought I saw it, but when I tried to fish it out, it was gone. Did I forget to put it in there? Did I miss when I was dropping it in? Was I seeing things? Did it melt? Hmmm. The one in the sealed vial of Noodler's Black still looks great. I restarted that dryout experiment. There's definitely a fragment in there now. We'll see. As for the fragment in BSB, it looked great, as did the others. Actually, the control fragments in Waterman Blue looked worse, though only kind of bleached in appearance with no other concerning artifact.

Interesting. I read about your (semi) controlled experiments on an FPN thread awhile ago. I much prefer this approach to strong opions based on unrepeatable ancedotes.

kaisnowbird
February 6th, 2014, 09:27 AM
It is inevitable that some fraction of sacs will be defective due to imperfect mixing and I've yet to see any evidence that this caused by inks. Plausible mechanisms would be highly basic inks (again) and organo-metallic dyes (metal ions can break down latex).


Yes, although I just had an unsettling experience. Awhile back I initiated an experiment where I put sac fragments in ink in an open container to let the ink evaporate and concentrate. I just checked on that experiment. I didn't do this with that many inks, just BSB, Noodler's Black, Bad Blue Heron, #41 Brown, and North African Violets. I checked all. I couldn't find the sac fragment in Noodler's Black. I thought I saw it, but when I tried to fish it out, it was gone. Did I forget to put it in there? Did I miss when I was dropping it in? Was I seeing things? Did it melt? Hmmm. The one in the sealed vial of Noodler's Black still looks great. I restarted that dryout experiment. There's definitely a fragment in there now. We'll see. As for the fragment in BSB, it looked great, as did the others. Actually, the control fragments in Waterman Blue looked worse, though only kind of bleached in appearance with no other concerning artifact.

Scary... :smow: How long did the first batch of dry out experiment run for?

mhosea
February 6th, 2014, 10:16 AM
Scary... :smow: How long did the first batch of dry out experiment run for?

Less than a month, since I know I delayed a week, maybe two, from when Dr. Grace's comments made me think of actually doing it (though I think we may have discussed the possibility as long ago as last April). I'm not being all that careful because my plan is to increase rigor when I feel that I'm on to something repeatable. I'm only interested in repeatable results, not adding to the list of anecdotal results. There are just too many possibilities here, so while I found it unsettling, I really do mean there's nothing worth doing other than to restart the experiment. I probably screwed up somehow. The fragment in the regular strength Noodler's Black (going on 10 months now) is more than just fine--it looks new. The short duration of this possible result is encouraging, as it means that to be on the safe side, you only need to avoid letting Noodler's Black dry out in your pens for the next month or so. ;)

mhosea
February 28th, 2014, 06:47 PM
3 weeks down. No degradation. Pretty sure I just screwed up somehow before, but I'll keep it going. I also checked the BSB fragment, which has been going longer. Looks fine.

carlos63
March 21st, 2014, 05:20 PM
I have the large eyedropper bottle of BSB. I've gotten it all over my hands that left stains for days...It leaves stains in my sink... I had to clean and soak my TWSBI 540 nib for a month. And yet... I will do it all over again and again because I love the intensity of the color... nothing I have encountered so far can touch it... classy, very classy... I like it, I love it, I want some more of it :) Don't even get me started on Noodler's Apache Sunset...Oh Yea!!!

kaisnowbird
March 21st, 2014, 08:52 PM
Now that's a die hard fan. :thumb:

welch
March 28th, 2014, 01:40 AM
I joked somewhere else, that Mike can add a mushed/melted sac I had in a Parker 51 Vac. I had been using Diamine Sapphire, an easy-going ink.

I use Noodlers Blue Eel and Ottoman Azure all the time. The rest of his inks don't appeal to me. I like blue, and most of his blue inks lean toward teal. I won;t use the specialty inks, since I have no need for them.

Noodlers does seem to have a QA problem, since Mr Noodler wants to be a one-man ink company. I suspect that his inks vary a bit from batch to batch. No idea if he's modifying the formula with each batch, or has trouble, as a one-man manufacturer, in exactly repeating an in from one batch to another. User "Corniche" at FPN once began an ink company. He described the difficulty of getting a recipe just right, and stopped when the supplier of one of his ingredients closed up. Noodlers must have trouble keeping so many inks flying.

Sailor Kenshin
March 28th, 2014, 07:03 AM
Well.

I got a sample of Bernanke Blue at the LIPS. I like it enough that I just ordered more from isellpens along with a Hero that was on sale. It's almost as bright as BSB but the color washed out of the converter. Unlike BSB.

mhosea
March 28th, 2014, 08:51 AM
Bernanke blue is a very nice color, indeed, essentially the same as Liberty's Elysium but a regular dye ink, not cellulose reactive. I don't like fast dry inks, though, because they soak into the paper to achieve that, so they tend to deliver a wider line and, on paper that allows it, more feathering. Horses for courses.

It's apparently very hard just to demonstrate a sac failure on demand, let alone prove cause and effect. I no longer worry about ink selection for fear of premature sac failure, especially since I learned from David Nishimura not to uncrimp Snorkel sac protectors, just use heat and wiggle them out. Now even changing the sac on a snorkel wouldn't be all that bad for me.

Sailor Kenshin
March 28th, 2014, 09:34 AM
The BB was made for southpaw hookers like myself. ;)

nigh means near
March 28th, 2014, 01:59 PM
I've been using Noodler's red-black in my TWSBI classic. I use it every day for hours on end (university) and have not had so much as a single hard start. I can't say the same about any other ink I've used (though to be fair, they've all been used in different pens). Still, the red-black is super reliable, and doesn't feather or bleed through even when using my Noodler's flex pens on cheap copy paper.

The X-Feather is also my go to drawing ink these days (even for brushes and dip pens). The only inks that even compete with its level of blackness are heavy, almost chunky pigment based drawing inks like Talens, which obviously are poison to fountain pens.

mhosea
April 5th, 2014, 09:50 PM
3 weeks down. No degradation. Pretty sure I just screwed up somehow before, but I'll keep it going. I also checked the BSB fragment, which has been going longer. Looks fine.

OK, just to put this one to bed, nothing going on. The replaced sac fragment in the dryout part of the Noodler's Black experiment is fine. The sac fragment in the sealed Noodler's vial has been in there almost a year, and it looks fine, too, maybe a bit more gray, but aren't we all. ;) Even the villainous BSB is not helping me out. Glad I'm not a starving grad student working on a PhD thesis!

dr.grace
April 5th, 2014, 10:37 PM
Thanks for your efforts, Mike. Even though the results are negative, they're reassuring, in a way. Anyway, I've stopped worrying about gooey sacs. These days I'm only concerned about particulate residue clogging feeds.

snedwos
April 8th, 2014, 08:18 PM
Hee hee! This afternoon I had a Vulcan's Coral Ahab (red/pink white swirl). It is now purple. My nose is blue. The inside of my coat is blue. My hands a blue (and I went to sea in a sieve, I did).

BSB is a pretty colour, but boy is it psychopathic.

I have had rather a lot of fun in 24 hours with my sample.

Dreck
April 9th, 2014, 10:48 AM
Hee hee! This afternoon I had a Vulcan's Coral Ahab (red/pink white swirl). It is now purple. My nose is blue. The inside of my coat is blue. My hands a blue (and I went to sea in a sieve, I did).

BSB is a pretty colour, but boy is it psychopathic.

I have had rather a lot of fun in 24 hours with my sample.

Interesting. Everyone else I know of who writes with a fountain pen uses their ink solely for that purpose. After your experimentation, do you find BSB to be a viable substitute for makeup and/or clothing dye?

snedwos
April 9th, 2014, 04:06 PM
Bay State Blue is clearly grossly offended by any colour other than itself. It actively pursues hue purity. Only violent shades of electric blue are acceptable. It is a genocidal maniac. It will stain anything with extreme prejudice. It wasn't even that big if a spill!

Jon Szanto
April 9th, 2014, 04:11 PM
http://thinkofthat.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Blue+Man+Group.jpg

The Good Captain
April 9th, 2014, 04:54 PM
Ah - the Blues Brothers.

mhosea
April 9th, 2014, 05:10 PM
Ah - the Blues Brothers.

The Blue Man Group response is as follows:

Jon Szanto
April 9th, 2014, 05:50 PM
Ok, we're already off the rails, and I can't resist. One of my all-time faves:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjQqp613g8w

mhosea
April 9th, 2014, 06:52 PM
I always wish the drums at 3:28 would go on longer before the song picks up again. Must have been cool being on stage for that bit.

mhosea
April 29th, 2014, 09:08 PM
It's been awhile since I checked all the sac fragments in the sealed inks, but I did so this evening. Several of these have had sac fragments in them for a full year, others about 8 months. The results so far:

Noodler's Blue -- gummy sac fragment (about like freshly chewed bubble gum), loss of elasticity (obviously)
Noodler's Black -- OK
Noodler's Nikita -- OK
Noodler's Baystate Blue -- OK
Noodler's Gruene Cactus Eel -- OK
Noodler's Qin Shi Huang -- OK
Noodler's #41 Brown -- OK
Noodler's Bad Belted Kingfisher -- OK
Noodler's Bad Blue Heron -- OK
Noodler's North African Violets -- OK
Noodler's Upper Ganges Blue -- OK
Noodler's Heart of Darkness -- OK
Sailor Sei Boku -- OK
Waterman Blue -- OK
Control samples -- all OK

Note that a single result like this is suggestive, but it's not sufficient unless we can replicate it, so the next step is to repeat with Noodler's Blue. If you have some Noodler's Blue and a hunk of a latex sac, I invite you to do the same. I am sure that the Noodler's Blue that the sac fragment was in did not have any phenol added. Unfortunately, I may have added some to my full bottles. Consequently, I am not in the greatest position even though I have two full bottles of Noodler's Blue. Finally, I'm pretty sure my bottle of Noodler's Blue was cross contaminated with a sample of Noodler's Blue Eel, so Blue Eel would be worth testing also.

If you want to give it a go, here's my methodology:

1. Take a latex sac remnant.
2. Divide it in two.
3. Place one half in a vial with the test ink, at least enough ink to immerse the sac fragment.
4. Place the other half in a "control" fluid. This might be an ink widely considered safe, such as Waterman Blue or Pelikan 4001 Royal Blue. I was using Waterman Blue for awhile, but I switched to distilled water with phenol as a preservative.
5. Wait a long time (months and months).
6. Fish out the sac fragment from the test ink and inspect it. If it seems OK, clean it, dry it, and then put it back.

The "dryout" version of the experiment is the same except don't seal it. Use less ink you want the sac to be partially exposed to the air during the dryout version.

Unfortunately, I may not have checked that fragment for some time, so even if we can replicate the result, it may take nearly a year to do it. I do not expect results in less than 6 months time. I hadn't done a dryout type experiment with Noodler's Blue, so it's possible that that avenue will yield an accelerated result, though.

whych
April 30th, 2014, 02:37 AM
The interesting thing about this is that BSB is not the culprit.
If phenol was a problem, we would have seen/heard that users of the old Parker Quink inks had similar problems with sacs melting in the past.

mhosea
April 30th, 2014, 05:37 AM
I don't worry about phenol. That's why I used it in my control fluid. However, I wish I could remember if I added any to the full bottles. It's just a variable I would prefer not to have tweaked for retesting purposes. Obviously I couldn't have added much to a full Noodler's bottle!

mydecemberht
May 2nd, 2014, 01:37 PM
I use both Noodlers Heart of Darkness, Baystate Blue(loveeeeee!) and Noodlers Vmail North African Violet...I've never had any issues in my Lamy, Ahabs or other pens so far. I wash my pens pretty well, and make sure not to leave any inks in them for too long though. I'd totally buy more Noodlers Inks...and hopefully another Ahab and figure out why I had so many issues with it.
Heather

Woody
May 3rd, 2014, 02:23 PM
Back to the original question. I think sometimes it's good for an ink maker to comment on the boards from time to time. Succinctly comment if you will. Also I believe that political statements don't belong on ink labels. That being said there are two Noodlers colors that I've had no problems with. Nightshade and Navy. The red black I tried to like but one bottle was not like the other. I think they do make a nice brown, not sure how wet that would be. I have a bottle of Goulet's Purple Heart that seems to clog a bit. Another question of the brand may be the Noodler pens that are somewhat temperamental. If one has a bad experience with a pen, it's quite likely they may transfer some of that opinion to a brand's inks. It's a natural thing that consumers do.

Dreck
May 3rd, 2014, 02:50 PM
Back to the original question. I think sometimes it's good for an ink maker to comment on the boards from time to time. Succinctly comment if you will. Also I believe that political statements don't belong on ink labels.

It is good for a maker to be in touch with his client base, true. While I agree with your former statement, I wholeheartedly disagree with the latter. I *love* the political commentary. They're spot-on, wickedly funny, some good history lessons, & make me want to try some colors just because the name intrigues me.


Another question of the brand may be the Noodler pens that are somewhat temperamental. If one has a bad experience with a pen, it's quite likely they may transfer some of that opinion to a brand's inks. It's a natural thing that consumers do.

I have three Noodler's pens, & my daughter has a fourth. Not a single one has given us a minute of hassle or headache. Same with the half-dozen bottles of their ink that I use.

Jon Szanto
May 3rd, 2014, 05:08 PM
I *love* the political commentary. They're spot-on, wickedly funny, some good history lessons, & make me want to try some colors just because the name intrigues me.

Well, someone who adopts Mr. Tardis's approach will be following "live by the sword, die by the sword": I, for one, am diametrically opposed to his viewpoints and, unlike you, they make me avoid the inks rather than be interested in them. If that is a fair trade-off for him as a retailer, then I guess he is making inks for some reason other than selling them. That doesn't make sense to me, but it's his venture, not mine.

mhosea
May 3rd, 2014, 05:58 PM
While I certainly concur that it s a "live by the sword, die by the sword" situation, how do you identify that you are diametrically opposed? I trust that your views are well-defined to you, but I must admit to some confusion over exactly what his views are after having read a few of his politically-oriented labels and listened to a few of his videos. His views on QE by the Fed are well-defined, but I wonder if people aren't projecting a lot of assumptions about his ideas onto the man just because he has harsh words for Democrats and thinks freedom and democracy are great things. Obviously he liked Scott Brown a lot, but it takes a certain amount of ignorance of Massachusetts politics to read a whole lot into that. What was it that Jon Stewart said? A Massachusetts Republican is like a gay Texas Democrat? He kind of sounds like a libertarian (by which I do not mean a member of the Libertarian Party) to me, but I don't have enough data to nail him down on the social spectrum, really, and this is my problem. I'm wondering how you were able to overcome it in order to compare your views with his on the social spectrum. If he actually is a libertarian, he'd be socially liberal, in which case Putin would perhaps be diametrically opposed.

Dreck
May 3rd, 2014, 06:16 PM
Well, someone who adopts Mr. Tardis's approach will be following "live by the sword, die by the sword": I, for one, am diametrically opposed to his viewpoints and, unlike you, they make me avoid the inks rather than be interested in them. If that is a fair trade-off for him as a retailer, then I guess he is making inks for some reason other than selling them. That doesn't make sense to me, but it's his venture, not mine.

And that's the beautiful thing about a American freedom. In a free-market economy where consumers are allowed to make their own choices & businesses are allowed to thrive or fail on their own inherent merits, a company like Noodler's can hire, market, & sell as they please.

broadoblique
May 3rd, 2014, 06:35 PM
I would definitely think Nathan is libertarian in his philosophy. In which case I'm sure he is very comfortable with others expressing strong negative views regarding his inks. As long as those views are thought out and the result of reason and fact. I'm sure he would have great respect for someone going through all the effort to actually test his inks - whether it reveals that they turn pricey pens into mush, or are well behaved, creative bargains. It's apparent to me that Nathan trusts the retail market to determine his successes and failures.

I'm very comfortable with Noodler's labels expressing strong political views. I haven't seen anything hateful, slanderous or harmful. I also find them entertaining, and I'll make the choice about reading them.

jackwebb
May 3rd, 2014, 07:07 PM
I have found most of his expressed views to be more patriotic then anything. If were offended by his views enough, I have the right not to buy his products, just as he has the right to express whatever view he wishes... Ain't America grand.

Jon Szanto
May 3rd, 2014, 07:16 PM
Mike, I probably took the shortest route possible when I said "diametrically opposed". I might have gone into a longer exposition as to how most everything I had ever seen him espouse tended to grate on me, but it really isn't important enough to elaborate. As others have so well stated, it is his right, and it is a free market, and he will do what he thinks best for him.

My only point was that it was enough of a turn-off to take me away from his inks. When I started with FPs a few years ago, this wasn't the case, but at some point, I just wasn't interested in his approach.

I've decided to not buy any of these paintings, as well...

http://pixel.nymag.com/imgs/daily/intelligencer/2013/02/08/bush1.o.jpg/a_560x0.jpg

mhosea
May 3rd, 2014, 07:21 PM
LOL

It did occur to me after I wrote that that you might have meant that you were opposed only to the quite specific views of his you had been confronted with, rather than the man's entire political identity, but I knew you would come back with a thoughtful reply.

Jon Szanto
May 3rd, 2014, 07:26 PM
...but I knew you would come back with a thoughtful reply.

Just who in the bleeding fuck do you have me confused with???


http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb204/EnvoyC/bitchslapbatmanrobin.gif

mhosea
May 3rd, 2014, 07:28 PM
Just who in the bleeding fuck do you have me confused with???

Lisa.

Jon Szanto
May 3rd, 2014, 07:39 PM
Lisa.

http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb204/EnvoyC/emotes/coffeescreen.gif

rgperedo
May 4th, 2014, 11:12 AM
I definitely didn't read through all 12 pages, I did read a nice chunk of the conversation and my points weren't mentioned sufficiently so perhaps this'll help someone or entertain someone. I am by no means an expert on ink, but one of the main elements that attracted me to Noodler's inks (which I only have two colors Noodler's black and 54th Mass. I only like Black or dark Blue-Black ink, I don't use any other colors) is the fact that they are archival and water resistant. I don't necessarily think that what I am writing is so crucial, but keeping a journal I would like this to last for as long as possible. Secondly as far as the waterproof ink goes, I draw a lot. I have other pens that I use for drawing and sketching, but I now only carry one pen for writing and drawing (consolidating pen space) so I need the ink to be able to perhaps take a light wash of watercolor over it. I have found other ink that I like (Sailor nano ink- Black of course) the Sailor ink is fine, but it does take a little longer to be "waterproof" so those are my two cents. I'm not emotionally invested in any of the inks I use, I just try to be pragmatic about what I want as a consumer and who will fill that need better. Right now it's Noodler's, if anyone else was producing archival and waterproof ink for fountain pens I would be interested in that as well. Cheers.

Plume145
July 22nd, 2014, 08:09 PM
After spending the afternoon trying some noodler's samples with my beloved glass nib dip pen (hand-blown murano glass, in a custom color way) and having the nib end up with unidentifiable sediment stuck in the grooves after only a couple of shades, thus turning the nib from perfectly clear to a shady, sickly greyish, I have now sworn off the stuff for good. I know people advocate for 'good pen hygiene' as the cure-all, but really, you couldn't imagine better pen hygiene than I used in this case: a GLASS pen (NOT plastic like most FP feeds), dunking in water with the ink still wet ON THE PAPER let alone the nib, and swirling vigorously to lose the ink, then dunking and swirling again in a cup of clean water. And still - a tint, from just one or two inks. A pen cleaner bath helped some, but it certainly isn't back to what it was.

I used to be neutral about noodler's - I couldn't understand the enthusiasm but I couldn't see why the hate from some, or why RIchard Binder would almost warn people away lol. Now I can. Moreover, it sounds like he can't/won't conduct adequate safety testing or even provide QC and consistency. That seems in line with my experience too. That's unacceptable for a company that purports to offer a complete, finished product, rather than the results of an experiment or a work-in-progress (with selective distribution to match). ESPECIALLY since he's all about pushing the boundaries of what FP ink is able to do, formula-wise (which I agree is interesting and totally worth exploring, BUT act like it's an experiment until you've got all your ducks in a row).

Marsilius
July 22nd, 2014, 09:56 PM
I have tried to do washes and THEN add ink lines on top, but I like to draw ink lines first, so get your drift. I do love the Sailor Nano black and even pen the way it gives when almost dry.

mhosea
July 23rd, 2014, 05:20 AM
After spending the afternoon trying some noodler's samples with my beloved glass nib dip pen (hand-blown murano glass, in a custom color way) and having the nib end up with unidentifiable sediment stuck in the grooves after only a couple of shades, thus turning the nib from perfectly clear to a shady, sickly greyish, I have now sworn off the stuff for good. I know people advocate for 'good pen hygiene' as the cure-all, but really, you couldn't imagine better pen hygiene than I used in this case: a GLASS pen (NOT plastic like most FP feeds), dunking in water with the ink still wet ON THE PAPER let alone the nib, and swirling vigorously to lose the ink, then dunking and swirling again in a cup of clean water. And still - a tint, from just one or two inks. A pen cleaner bath helped some, but it certainly isn't back to what it was.


We can probably draw a box around the problem that doesn't encompass the entire brand. Some of the cellulose-reactive (bulletproof) colors do leave a residue on glass and metal surfaces (at least). Ironically, I'm not sure I've ever seen this layer form on plastic, though I would not go so far as to surmise that it doesn't. Anyway, if you transfer Noodler's Heart of Darkness from one bottle to another, you will see this residue of it left behind on the bottle. I have tried solvent-based approaches to removing it from the inside of the bottle, but in the end I do not know of any household solvent that works at all, let alone a "safe" and effective one. And yet, if one reaches in with a finger or cloth, it wipes easily off the surface. After having such trouble removing it by circulating and soaking liquids, it seems rather dramatic how easily it is removed mechanically by wiping. My inexpensive ultrasonic removes it, also, though effectively cleaning it out of the recessed parts of the nib and feed is not immediate.

It is not my purpose to defend it, rather to describe and explain it, to make it a known phenomenon rather than something unexpected and potentially misunderstood.

Should it be feared? Is this residue dangerous to pens? I don't know. I have no evidence of that. I have conducted a pen dry-out experiment with Noodler's Heart of Darkness, and there were no difficulties flushing out the pen. It merely took longer. Flushing vintage inks out of vintage pens also takes awhile. I can't rule out that the residue might react with some other ink, but the residue seems inert, and it never seems to build up. I have yet only seen what appears to be one layer, and one layer only.

But if it's not actually dangerous, is it still a problem? For me, yes, it is somewhat, though I use my ultrasonic cleaner with some regularity, and my pen hygiene is sufficient to remove it. Still, I tend to relegate these inks to c/c pens.

Plume145
July 23rd, 2014, 06:06 AM
After spending the afternoon trying some noodler's samples with my beloved glass nib dip pen (hand-blown murano glass, in a custom color way) and having the nib end up with unidentifiable sediment stuck in the grooves after only a couple of shades, thus turning the nib from perfectly clear to a shady, sickly greyish, I have now sworn off the stuff for good. I know people advocate for 'good pen hygiene' as the cure-all, but really, you couldn't imagine better pen hygiene than I used in this case: a GLASS pen (NOT plastic like most FP feeds), dunking in water with the ink still wet ON THE PAPER let alone the nib, and swirling vigorously to lose the ink, then dunking and swirling again in a cup of clean water. And still - a tint, from just one or two inks. A pen cleaner bath helped some, but it certainly isn't back to what it was.


We can probably draw a box around the problem that doesn't encompass the entire brand. Some of the cellulose-reactive (bulletproof) colors do leave a residue on glass and metal surfaces (at least). Ironically, I'm not sure I've ever seen this layer form on plastic, though I would not go so far as to surmise that it doesn't. Anyway, if you transfer Noodler's Heart of Darkness from one bottle to another, you will see this residue of it left behind on the bottle. I have tried solvent-based approaches to removing it from the inside of the bottle, but in the end I do not know of any household solvent that works at all, let alone a "safe" and effective one. And yet, if one reaches in with a finger or cloth, it wipes easily off the surface. After having such trouble removing it by circulating and soaking liquids, it seems rather dramatic how easily it is removed mechanically by wiping. My inexpensive ultrasonic removes it, also, though effectively cleaning it out of the recessed parts of the nib and feed is not immediate.

It is not my purpose to defend it, rather to describe and explain it, to make it a known phenomenon rather than something unexpected and potentially misunderstood.

Should it be feared? Is this residue dangerous to pens? I don't know. I have no evidence of that. I have conducted a pen dry-out experiment with Noodler's Heart of Darkness, and there were no difficulties flushing out the pen. It merely took longer. Flushing vintage inks out of vintage pens also takes awhile. I can't rule out that the residue might react with some other ink, but the residue seems inert, and it never seems to build up. I have yet only seen what appears to be one layer, and one layer only.

But if it's not actually dangerous, is it still a problem? For me, yes, it is somewhat, though I use my ultrasonic cleaner with some regularity, and my pen hygiene is sufficient to remove it. Still, I tend to relegate these inks to c/c pens.
No, it's good to know this stuff, I definitely appreciate some describing and explaining! Especially your experience cleaning this out, I will be sure to try some mechanical action. I have a cheap little ultrasonic cleaner, but it's too small to fit this pen, so I'll try the toothbrush.

I'm not sure which lines these were from - it was all samples, so I just had the brand and shade name. The first one I did colored the nib a faint pink; it was baystate cranberry (even though I was extra-careful as a result of all I've heard about Baystate Blue), and then I did the rest: Burgundy, Rome Burning, Tianamen, Borealis Black, Cayenne, Liberty's Elysium, Cactus Fruit American Eel, El Lawrence, Green, Black Eel, and Habanero. It's somewhere in those that the sediment went from faint pink (from BSCranberry) to the current slimy grayish.

I guess labelling is an issue too; I hope the bottles are clearly labelled as very strong inks requiring extraordinary precautions. It couldn't hurt if anyone who made packaged samples (Goulets, isellpens, Anderson's, etc) also put that warning on the samples, although it's more understandable if they don't because of the lack of space. Still, I guess they could do it with a symbol, like a ⚠

I see what you mean about there being no evidence of harm. Well, part of me is thinking, 'absence of proof is not proof of absence', lol, but even so, the bigger part of me wonders simply, why bother?

I always thought the necessity for everything-proof ink was overstated, whether your bogeyman was forgers or father time :P - many of the people who just have to have it zomg!, don't really need it. Even if you do, you can use these with a cheap dip pen (glass ones can be had for as little as $10). For on the go, buy a $3 preppy! At that price, it's practically a throwaway pen for most any pen budget - a pen you could just bin if cleaning it would mean wasting gallons of water and tons of time. Which it probably won't anyway, since it can be disassembled completely, the nib separated from the feed and grip section.

In other words, it seems easier and more sensible to treat these as gimmick inks and use them accordingly, and take regular ink business to one of the many other ink companies out there who don't have this kind of issue. Does that make sense?

Sailor Kenshin
July 23rd, 2014, 07:22 AM
I still like some of the Noodler's colors (can you say old-style BSIAR?), still have, what, five full-sized bottles, and maybe 20 samples, but from now I'm only using them in inexpensive CC pens.

Except for Bad Green Gator. That's my check-writing ink in an (equally) inexpensive Hero 329.

TMac
July 23rd, 2014, 07:39 AM
I have no deep knowledge of ink and it's harmful properties to our beloved pens. While I see a lot of strong passions from both sides on Noodlers, are there concerns about Diamine? I used to use a lot of Noodlers ink but was fearful to put it in my "nicer" pens based on others comments. I love the array of great colors Noodlers produces, so I found Diamine to be close in the number of colors. Are there fears with Diamine similar to Noodlers as to potential damage?

Waski_the_Squirrel
July 23rd, 2014, 09:45 AM
The problem may have come from the inclusion of a Baystate ink in your sampling. These will react and create interesting new compounds that have the consistency of sludge. I've done it on purpose...and then had a lot of trouble cleaning the residue from said sludge out of the beaker!

I don't know if the Baystate is your problem, but it easily could be.


As for the post about Diamine: I'll admit the brand does nothing for me, but I really loved the Ancient Copper. I got a sample and discovered a shocking amount of crusty growth all over the nib and feed. I read about the ink and found that it does this in some pens, though not all. Other than this one, I'm not sure. In fairness, the crusty growth seemed to wash off, but it did ruin the experience for me. Luckily, I found a color in another brand that is quite similar.

TMac
July 23rd, 2014, 10:56 AM
The problem may have come from the inclusion of a Baystate ink in your sampling. These will react and create interesting new compounds that have the consistency of sludge. I've done it on purpose...and then had a lot of trouble cleaning the residue from said sludge out of the beaker!

I don't know if the Baystate is your problem, but it easily could be.




As for the post about Diamine: I'll admit the brand does nothing for me, but I really loved the Ancient Copper. I got a sample and discovered a shocking amount of crusty growth all over the nib and feed. I read about the ink and found that it does this in some pens, though not all. Other than this one, I'm not sure. In fairness, the crusty growth seemed to wash off, but it did ruin the experience for me. Luckily, I found a color in another brand that is quite similar.

I've started away from both Diamine Pumpkin and Ancient Copper. Testing samples of both, I loved the color. However, the crusting on the nib caused me to stay away. What alternate ink to you find?

Waski_the_Squirrel
July 23rd, 2014, 11:13 AM
I've started away from both Diamine Pumpkin and Ancient Copper. Testing samples of both, I loved the color. However, the crusting on the nib caused me to stay away. What alternate ink to you find?

You won't like this, but I found Noodler's Antietam to be a much better behaved alternative.

mhosea
July 23rd, 2014, 12:31 PM
I have a cheap little ultrasonic cleaner, but it's too small to fit this pen, so I'll try the toothbrush.


Toothbrush is good. To use a smaller ultrasonic, and to use an ultrasonic at all with a piston, plunger, lever-fill, or just about anything except a C/C or ED, you'll want to suspend most of the pen out of the basin, anyway. Here's a photo I made of a mock-up of how I use my ultrasonic to clean, say, a piston-type pen. I just take an ordinary piece of cardboard and poke a hole that will hold the pen tightly.

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5225/13951444878_f347728fe0.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/nfQNv5)




I see what you mean about there being no evidence of harm. Well, part of me is thinking, 'absence of proof is not proof of absence', lol, but even so, the bigger part of me wonders simply, why bother?


Yes, I understand and agree to some extent. There is no life without risk. You must always decide whether any choice makes sense based on weighing the risks, rewards, and probabilities. You will almost always make such choices based on imperfect information. So take your best guess. It's always easiest when "why bother?" reveals that you have little to gain.



In other words, it seems easier and more sensible to treat these as gimmick inks and use them accordingly, and take regular ink business to one of the many other ink companies out there who don't have this kind of issue. Does that make sense?

That would make sense if you actually knew the risks. The more interesting the inks, the less you really know, but the greater the rewards if you are an inkophile. If Waterman Blue and Waterman Black is all you need to be happy, then I think you'll be pretty safe. Otherwise, welcome to the deep end.

As for Noodler's, I don't accept them as a brand. Rather I take them one at a time. Always have. In point of fact, I don't buy any Noodler's inks for their permanence properties. The gimmicks are just trivial details from my perspective. I don't know how many Noodler's inks I've tried at this point. A few dozen probably. I gave most of them away for one reason or another, often because they give me more of those little delayed "skip-starts" after a pause than my better inks, but in some cases I gave them away because the colors were boring to me. Some I stopped using because I was annoyed by the residue and found no sufficient reasons to put up with it, i.e. my "why bother?" The ones I still use are few but beloved: Noodler's Navy, Noodler's Upper Ganges Blue, Noodler's Ottoman Rose. In addition to these, I happen to use Noodler's La Couleur Royale and Gruene Cactus Eel because I have them and find them adequate. I will not replace them when I run out, however (if I ever run out). OTOH, with the first three I would have no trouble telling you why I bother. I love the hue of Noodler's Ottoman Rose, Navy is an all-around excellent ink (full strength and diluted), and UGB, while a bit too muted a color, offers a superb smooth-writing experience with reliable start-up. I really don't care that Navy is "partially bulletproof", but occasionally the fact that UGB is waterproof comes in handy (since I am a bit of a messy cook).

Plume145
July 23rd, 2014, 06:54 PM
Toothbrush is good. To use a smaller ultrasonic, and to use an ultrasonic at all with a piston, plunger, lever-fill, or just about anything except a C/C or ED, you'll want to suspend most of the pen out of the basin, anyway. Here's a photo I made of a mock-up of how I use my ultrasonic to clean, say, a piston-type pen. I just take an ordinary piece of cardboard and poke a hole that will hold the pen tightly.

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5225/13951444878_f347728fe0.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/nfQNv5)




I see what you mean about there being no evidence of harm. Well, part of me is thinking, 'absence of proof is not proof of absence', lol, but even so, the bigger part of me wonders simply, why bother?


Yes, I understand and agree to some extent. There is no life without risk. You must always decide whether any choice makes sense based on weighing the risks, rewards, and probabilities. You will almost always make such choices based on imperfect information. So take your best guess. It's always easiest when "why bother?" reveals that you have little to gain.



In other words, it seems easier and more sensible to treat these as gimmick inks and use them accordingly, and take regular ink business to one of the many other ink companies out there who don't have this kind of issue. Does that make sense?

That would make sense if you actually knew the risks. The more interesting the inks, the less you really know, but the greater the rewards if you are an inkophile. If Waterman Blue and Waterman Black is all you need to be happy, then I think you'll be pretty safe. Otherwise, welcome to the deep end.

As for Noodler's, I don't accept them as a brand. Rather I take them one at a time. Always have. In point of fact, I don't buy any Noodler's inks for their permanence properties. The gimmicks are just trivial details from my perspective. I don't know how many Noodler's inks I've tried at this point. A few dozen probably. I gave most of them away for one reason or another, often because they give me more of those little delayed "skip-starts" after a pause than my better inks, but in some cases I gave them away because the colors were boring to me. Some I stopped using because I was annoyed by the residue and found no sufficient reasons to put up with it, i.e. my "why bother?" The ones I still use are few but beloved: Noodler's Navy, Noodler's Upper Ganges Blue, Noodler's Ottoman Rose. In addition to these, I happen to use Noodler's La Couleur Royale and Gruene Cactus Eel because I have them and find them adequate. I will not replace them when I run out, however (if I ever run out). OTOH, with the first three I would have no trouble telling you why I bother. I love the hue of Noodler's Ottoman Rose, Navy is an all-around excellent ink (full strength and diluted), and UGB, while a bit too muted a color, offers a superb smooth-writing experience with reliable start-up. I really don't care that Navy is "partially bulletproof", but occasionally the fact that UGB is waterproof comes in handy (since I am a bit of a messy cook).
oooh, hang on a sec, I think I know what's going on! I suspect it's like with computer systems, where people can't seem to get on the same page because one lot is all about tinkering and the computer's inner workings, whereas the other lot couldn't care less, they need the computer to just work, to get out of their way so they can get stuff done. For both groups, computers could be a huge part of life or nothing more than a rainy day pastime, it's just the focus is different.

The part where you said 'If Waterman Blue and Waterman Black is all you need to be happy, then I think you'll be pretty safe. Otherwise, welcome to the deep end.'? That was a total 'tinkerer' thing to say! lol. Because in fact, for me it's neither - these are both extremes and generally, extremes don't 'just work', you need the happy medium, the slight compromises and the meeting halfway. So for computers, feature creep is just as terrible for 'just work' users as a dearth of features.

Same here: 'anything goes' is not practical because I can't supply the kind of experimenting you mention, but neither is sticking to just a blue ink or two, because I need a lot more variety than that (both for functional reasons eg color coding, and because I write a lot so I need to mix it up so I don't get bored).

Or where you said you judge each ink individually - that kind of experimental approach is part of the draw to a tinkerer, but to a 'get it done' type like me, that just sounds like a slog haha. Just like my 'why bother?' comment was totally typical of the 'I don't care what's wrong with it, please please just fix it so I can get back to work. I'll pay anything!' approach. That's why you can be so specific about just what it is you like about each of the noodler's you do like - which I could never do - and why my need for a few go-to brands I can rely on to have good overall performance across their range probably strikes you as too simplistic. Whatever you say about noodler's, it definitely doesn't seem to be such a brand, so for me, it's out of the running as a go-to supplier.

Ah well, takes all kinds right? haha :P

Which is great because the tinkering is probably what led to that fantastic idea for how to float the pen! I love that, so handy! I'd been thinking of blue tacking it to the side of the container, but that sucks because it would be on its side. I never would have gone for this, and I love this trick because it's applicable to so many other situations where you need something partially submerged. Sweet! I'm trying it tomorrow.

Plume145
July 23rd, 2014, 07:05 PM
I have no deep knowledge of ink and it's harmful properties to our beloved pens. While I see a lot of strong passions from both sides on Noodlers, are there concerns about Diamine? I used to use a lot of Noodlers ink but was fearful to put it in my "nicer" pens based on others comments. I love the array of great colors Noodlers produces, so I found Diamine to be close in the number of colors. Are there fears with Diamine similar to Noodlers as to potential damage?
I've not heard anything massively bad, and FWIW it's one of only two inks that Richard Binder actually recommends. I'm with you that the range of colors is comparable, that plus the recommendation (and a range of practical stuff like size, pricing, availability, etc) are what made me pick it as one of my staple brands in addition to my old fave, Herbin. It honestly doesn't sound like you could go far wrong, especially if you're a teensy bit careful with the reddish colors.


The problem may have come from the inclusion of a Baystate ink in your sampling. These will react and create interesting new compounds that have the consistency of sludge. I've done it on purpose...and then had a lot of trouble cleaning the residue from said sludge out of the beaker!

I don't know if the Baystate is your problem, but it easily could be.

gah, never thought of that! Thanks for pointing it out - it was the first one I did too, so there's a definite possibility.

I still like some of the Noodler's colors (can you say old-style BSIAR?), still have, what, five full-sized bottles, and maybe 20 samples, but from now I'm only using them in inexpensive CC pens.

Except for Bad Green Gator. That's my check-writing ink in an (equally) inexpensive Hero 329.
well, see? I've never had to write a check yet, and it doesn't look like I ever will! But if I did, I'd buy the cheapest ever pen or just use a dip pen since I'd almost certainly be writing it at home not on the go. But yeah - cheap pens all the way, like cheapest of the cheap. Preppies should do it since you take everything apart, which I believe is the case with a lot of chinese pens too, right? All three of mine do, anyway - right down to feed and nib. I mean heck, surely it will get clean then, right? If you can take out the feed and blast it with some staz on alcohol ink remover, lol?

mhosea
July 23rd, 2014, 08:15 PM
That was a total 'tinkerer' thing to say!

Guilty! :) I am driven to understand just about everything I see, though I admit that I'm getting more complacent about low-level computer technology as I get older. Unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of ignoring it completely. Just today I was forced to think about rewriting a merge sort algorithm to be more cache-friendly with large arrays.

Diamine is a pretty good brand, though there are some one-off problems here and there, such as hard starts and staining with Sargasso Sea, and slow-drying with Majestic Blue. Montblanc inks are mostly nice, if somewhat limited in colors. Lately, I've really been enjoying Sailor-made inks, and if the variety of the standard imports is not sufficient for your taste, you can import specialty Sailor-made inks (e.g., search for "Nagasawa Kobe Ink") through EBay for $20 shipped. You just have to wait an extra week or so, versus ordering something domestically, for them to arrive.

raging.dragon
July 24th, 2014, 02:09 AM
I have no deep knowledge of ink and it's harmful properties to our beloved pens. While I see a lot of strong passions from both sides on Noodlers, are there concerns about Diamine? I used to use a lot of Noodlers ink but was fearful to put it in my "nicer" pens based on others comments. I love the array of great colors Noodlers produces, so I found Diamine to be close in the number of colors. Are there fears with Diamine similar to Noodlers as to potential damage?

Some diamine inks will stain plastic: demonstrator pens, ink windows, converters, etc..

It is unwise to assume any brand is always safe or always problematic. Even the claim that inks branded by large pen makers are safe is easily falsified, for example: Parker Superchrome inks would destroy pens, and Parker Penman inks had a reputation for clogging pens.

Plume145
July 24th, 2014, 02:13 PM
That was a total 'tinkerer' thing to say!

Guilty! :) I am driven to understand just about everything I see, though I admit that I'm getting more complacent about low-level computer technology as I get older. Unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of ignoring it completely. Just today I was forced to think about rewriting a merge sort algorithm to be more cache-friendly with large arrays.

Diamine is a pretty good brand, though there are some one-off problems here and there, such as hard starts and staining with Sargasso Sea, and slow-drying with Majestic Blue. Montblanc inks are mostly nice, if somewhat limited in colors. Lately, I've really been enjoying Sailor-made inks, and if the variety of the standard imports is not sufficient for your taste, you can import specialty Sailor-made inks (e.g., search for "Nagasawa Kobe Ink") through EBay for $20 shipped. You just have to wait an extra week or so, versus ordering something domestically, for them to arrive.
Okay, can't say I understand much about that last sentence in the first bit, but I get the idea at least! And I understand the impulse to understand things, I just lack it with inks. I think the same person can be more of a tinkerer with some things than others, or it could even vary during a lifetime (like you with those low-level computer' things). In fact I bet it's actually the norm.

One of my all time favorite inks is Sailor actually! It's the Orange from the Jentle line. It just makes me think of orange groves with the sun shining through the trees - oblique so you get the maximum effect of lighting with minimal heat and glare. I don't think I've ever seen an ink with this much visual impact! And I get a lot of shading with most of the pens and papers I've used it. I do lean towards pens that are fairly wet and not too skinny and definitely prefer paper that is smooth bordering on shiny, so that probably helps, but I think I've seen others mention the shading on this one too. I was going to link to a sample but to my surprise none of them seem to put the beauty of this ink across very well! They all look too orange, sort of dark and dull - it's probably hard to capture it well!

Thanks for the tip on the specialty inks! I will look them up, and the time is fine for me because as I'm in Greece, I'm always ordering from far away.

I also know to stay away from Sargasso Sea - hard starts definitely counts as a 'doesn't work' thing! thanks for the warning, I particularly appreciate it because color-wise it would make a good alternative to my current mainstay, Herbin Bleu Nuit. Part of the draw for me in sticking to just 2-3 brands 90% of the time is that it's much easier to research those a little bit; if I've decided to stick to Herbin, Diamine, and maybe De Atramentis, and I want a blue-black, that gives me what, less than half a dozen inks? Googling them is totally doable.

It cuts through that feeling of OMG, there's just endless alternatives. Like if you normally shop at a small mom and pop grocery store where buying choc chip cookies means choosing between a whole three kinds, and finding yourself in a supermarket where you get twenty kinds! o_O I just hate that feeling, makes me wall-eyed haha, so I always find myself coming up with criteria to exclude whole groups. Am I weird? probably lol.

mhosea
July 5th, 2015, 02:03 PM
Unfortunately, I may not have checked that fragment for some time, so even if we can replicate the result, it may take nearly a year to do it. I do not expect results in less than 6 months time. I hadn't done a dryout type experiment with Noodler's Blue, so it's possible that that avenue will yield an accelerated result, though.

Just checked both of the additional runs (several fragments each). None of the fragments in Noodler's Blue has deteriorated this time. I also tested Ottoman Rose and Noodler's Navy. There is nothing to report: all fragments, both treatment and control, appear to be in good condition.

FredRydr
July 8th, 2015, 12:36 PM
There seems to be some prejudice against Noodler's....

I'm guilty. I figure, why invite trouble when there are so many alternatives available?

Fred

ms8109
January 8th, 2017, 08:20 PM
i've used Noodlers inks, although not very often as i have 193 bottles of different colors of inks and approx. 125 sample bottles. So you see the chances of Noodles coming up for rotation are slim in my collection. That being said, of the bottles of noodles i possess, and BSB is one of them. i have yet to have a problem with this brand of ink, provided that i use good pen / ink hygiene as everyone should :-)


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Best Regards,
Mike