Aakerman inks...thoughts?

[stevekolt]

As the title saya...

[The Good Captain]

Yes - nice ink. Fantastic bottles. Good colours.

[Pterodactylus]

Not much to say, produced by Diamine, so well known Diamine quality.

Most likely you can get the Diamine siblings cheaper, for those which are a 100% clone (only a few which are identical).
On the other hand are the Akkerman bottles awesome, which alone justifies a little higher cost.

Since they changed from the big bottles to the small ones they are not a real bargain anymore (massive price increase compared to before.....I did not bought their inks since then anymore, because personally I was angry about this massive price increase)

[dfo]

+1 Diamine inks. Good quality.

Not much to say, produced by Diamine, so well known Diamine quality.

Most likely you can get the Diamine siblings cheaper, for those which are a 100% clone (only a few which are identical).
On the other hand are the Akkerman bottles awesome, which alone justifies a little higher cost.

Since they changed from the big bottles to the small ones they are not a real bargain anymore (massive price increase compared to before.....I did not bought their inks since then anymore, because personally I was angry about this massive price increase)

[bleunuitguy]

I've enjoyed the two inks that I have. They behave well on different papers, and the two I have are nice rich colours. I own shocking Blue and Dutch Masters Stormy Blue. I think that these inks are slightly different than their Diamine analogues. For example, SB doesn't smear like Majestic blue and Stormy Blue is a bit wetter than Diamine Eclipse. (At least from what I can tell) I'm sure others have different experiences due to different ways pens. I tend to use Lamy 2000 and Pilot Vanishing Point.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[jar]

Pretty but near useless bottles. Nice ink.

[Stickler]

I find Akkerman to be slightly different than the other Diamines. I don't know why. The colors appeal to my desire for understated colors that are still really beautiful to look at.

[ambimom]

I bought limited edition Dutch Masters green for the bottle design, which is lovely as well as practical. The Akkerman ink is fine. Overall, Diamine is my favorite because I can't get Chesterfield inks anymore since X Fountain closed shop but its replacement Birmingham Pens has its own brand of inks that are really nice too. I'm hoarding my bottle of Chesterfield sapphire blue until I find something similar.

[grainweevil]

Apparently I'm the anti-jar - I'd like a bottle, but the actual inks haven't grabbed me sufficiently for me to buy one. I should probably admit to being a tad ho-hum about Diamine inks, which really doesn't help.

[Chrissy]

I've always been led to believe that the inks are made by Diamine, but I would also love an Akkerman bottle.

[Jon Szanto]

Come for the ink, stay for the bottle. I've only purchased two, and those were in the old smaller size, but I decanted and use the bottles for my two most common inks.

BTW: I thought you were getting out of this racket?

[mhosea]

Just for reference, here is a pair of match-ups that I did awhile back. I have no reason to doubt that there are Akkerman exclusive colors as well, but they have a lot of colors in the line-up. Would expect only a subset of exclusives.

[KKay]

I have one Akkerman ink, and I love it. The bottle is awesome. The price is a bit high. I'd have a few if they weren't so expensive.

[stevekolt]

Getting out of the acquistion phase. Narrowing it down to a very few select pens and inks...

[alexander_k]

Leaving the bottles aside, the inks are certainly worth the trouble and expense. As already pointed out, there are some that match Diamine inks in all respects and others that don't. The latter include some of my favourites, like Diep-duinwaterblauw.

[Scooby921]

I enjoy the couple of Akkerman inks we have in our house. There might be a cheaper Diamine equivalent, but the price of the Akkeman inks has never bothered me. The production cost on the bottles is higher. Lower volume product and the variability in the glass bottle means a person (or expensive machine) has to check the diameter of the opening between the upper and lower ink reservoirs and pick the correct size marble to seal it. Not all of the bottles come down the line with exactly the same shape, so they have to keep a variety of different marble diameters on hand and fit them per bottle. Too small falls through, too big doesn't seal. If Akkerman is made by Diamine then you can factor in the cost of production line change-over. Machines and workers sit idle as the various carriers, trays, nozzles, label printers, etc. are changed to deal with differences between the Diamine and Akkerman bottles. I doubt the production difference justifies the entire price difference, but I think the couple extra dollars we pay in addition to those production fees is acceptable for the truly unique colors and bottle. If there is an equivalent Diamine color by all means save the money and buy the Diamine branded one.

[FredRydr]

I've resisted adding yet more ink to my ink box, fancy bottle or not. I'm still alive and thriving with the inks I have.

When any ink bottle is down to the end, I simply pour or eyedropper it into the section end of a Pelikan (and I have enough of those). Therefore, the Aakerman bottle is not something I need. And now that I know it's Diamine ink anyway (first post above was news to me), I have plenty of that so I don't need "Aakerman" ink either. I'm free!!

Fred

[writingrav]

I too like the bottles. Two of the inks that I have are among my favorites: Hofvijver Griis and Oost-Indigo (forgive all misspellings, please,) but the Shocking Blue, which color I liked, gunked up a pen.

[KKay]

I liked the color of Shocking Blue a lot. The sheen was gorgeous. It clogged my pen too. So off the list it went rather quickly. I tried Diep Duinwaterblauw...I liked it, but I didn't love it. The Zuiderpark Blauw-Groen though is wonderful. (in my opinion)

[Robert]

I liked the color of Shocking Blue a lot. The sheen was gorgeous. It clogged my pen too. So off the list it went rather quickly. I tried Diep Duinwaterblauw...I liked it, but I didn't love it. The Zuiderpark Blauw-Groen though is wonderful. (in my opinion)

I had a similar problem with Shocking Blue. I wouldn't say it clogged my pen, but the flow was on the stingy side - - - too dry an ink for my tastes.