Noodler's Bay State Blue

[NLP]

I'm not sure if this topic has been discussed recently, but can ink cause plastic to crack? A while back I loaded up my NOS Parker 75 Custom that I got from Lee Tah with BSB. The pen was perfect with a mint 18K Broad Italic nib. I wrote a few pages and put the pen back in my case for two days. I went to retrieve the pen to use that great looking ink for addressing a few letters. I uncapped it and it wouldn't start. I looked at the nib and to my dismay there was a LARGE crack running through the feed. Can any type of chemical reaction with BSB/plastic cause this? BTW, I threw the entire bottle of this ink away. I still however use the Noodler's Inks often.

 

TIA

Ashley

[blopplop]

Oh my, I hope the ink wasn't the cause. How sad about your pen.

 

Dave

[Pendragon]

I have heard people claim that Baystate Blue clogged feeds and stained pens, but never chemically attacking a feed. If it did so, there should have been many complaints about this problem long ago. If you ever come across a problematic bottle of ink, it might be a good idea to save it so it can be sent to the manufacturer. This allows them to investigate the reported issue and determine if it was caused by the ink. It would be surprising if it was the ink, though. Noodler's inks are pretty darned good in my experience, and seem to be highly regarded by many other fountain pen users.

 

Sorry to hear about your pen.

[Tsujigiri]

Plastics are pretty tough chemically, so I doubt that was the problem. Sorry to hear about your pen... but you shouldn't have thrown away the ink. I'm sure you could have sold it or used it with a dip pen...

[mus]

Baystate Blue ate the feed on my lamy al-star. nib snapped right off. I had heard this might happen but thought it must be exaggerated. but it seems to destroy the plastic in the feeds of lamy safari/al-star/studio. I talked with my local pen store and they said they just heard from a pen repair person that they found a baystate that had turned soild and fused with the plastic in another pen, non lamy. it seems clear baystate blue is a problem and can do more than stain. with all that, while its a nice color. it ain't worth it. move on. p

[mus]

I have heard people claim that Baystate Blue clogged feeds and stained pens, but never chemically attacking a feed. If it did so, there should have been many complaints about this problem long ago. If you ever come across a problematic bottle of ink, it might be a good idea to save it so it can be sent to the manufacturer. This allows them to investigate the reported issue and determine if it was caused by the ink. It would be surprising if it was the ink, though. Noodler's inks are pretty darned good in my experience, and seem to be highly regarded by many other fountain pen users.

 

Sorry to hear about your pen.

 

There have been many complaints on this forum, especially about lamy pens.

[Possum Hill]

Baystate Blue ate the feed on my lamy al-star. nib snapped right off. I had heard this might happen but thought it must be exaggerated. but it seems to destroy the plastic in the feeds of lamy safari/al-star/studio. I talked with my local pen store and they said they just heard from a pen repair person that they found a baystate that had turned soild and fused with the plastic in another pen, non lamy. it seems clear baystate blue is a problem and can do more than stain. with all that, while its a nice color. it ain't worth it. move on. p

There have been lots of posts, involving Baystate Blue, about things people have heard from someone who heard it from someone else. If anything so weird as BSB turning solid and fusing with the plastic of a pen had actually occurred I would expect to see a photo of that here on FPN. It seems much more likely that someone managed to evaporate all the water in the ink, leaving behind hardened dye that had to be chipped out.

[effrafax]

Baystate Blue ate the feed on my lamy al-star. nib snapped right off. I had heard this might happen but thought it must be exaggerated. but it seems to destroy the plastic in the feeds of lamy safari/al-star/studio. I talked with my local pen store and they said they just heard from a pen repair person that they found a baystate that had turned soild and fused with the plastic in another pen, non lamy. it seems clear baystate blue is a problem and can do more than stain. with all that, while its a nice color. it ain't worth it. move on. p

There have been lots of posts, involving Baystate Blue, about things people have heard from someone who heard it from someone else. If anything so weird as BSB turning solid and fusing with the plastic of a pen had actually occurred I would expect to see a photo of that here on FPN. It seems much more likely that someone managed to evaporate all the water in the ink, leaving behind hardened dye that had to be chipped out.

 

Here, here. Or hear, hear.

 

Whilst I haven't used the much feared BSB, I've read so much about it here that it's not funny.

 

The issue with Lamy Safaris/Vistas et. al. has been done to death, and been shown to be a fault with the feeds, nothing to do with the ink.

 

Too much hearsay, not enough facts.

 

 

Edit: fixed silliness.

Edited September 16, 2009 by effrafax

[celthana]

If BSB is known for staining/clogging, could it be possible that it solidified in the feed then somehow expanded, causing the crack or widening a microscopic crack that had been there?

[Randal6393]

Possibly Baystate Blue had something to do with exacerbating an existing crack. But it is not possible to say with any certainty.

 

To my mind, the reason for not using BSB is that it stains anything it touches. Noodler inks, new formulation, usually are cellulose-reactive and can be washed off a sink or plastics without any stains. On paper, many Noodler inks chemically bond to the cellulose in the paper and become waterproof. This property is why I use Heart of Darkness and Polar Blue as my most common inks.

 

Baystate Blue is a redo of an old formula from the 1950's or so. It is alkaline, stains dreadfully, and is arguably the brightest blue currently available. If it meets your needs, use it. If it doesn't, well, there are many other fine inks available. I stopped using it because of the staining. If it was implicated in harming one of my pens, I would certainly not use it.

 

Best of luck to you,

[Tsujigiri]

There have been many complaints on this forum, especially about lamy pens.

 

I think Lamy pens are pretty well-liked here... and I've heard a lot of good things about their customer service.

[brianw06]

There have been many complaints on this forum, especially about lamy pens.

 

I think Lamy pens are pretty well-liked here... and I've heard a lot of good things about their customer service.

I don't think the poster was dishing Lamy, only that there were a lot of reports on BSB and it's affects on lamy.

edited to add: my "45" and a "21" were both eaten by BSB. The hoods softened and basically fell apart

Edited September 18, 2009 by macthemaths
BY MODERATOR to remove a distracting personal comment.

[lapis]

Lemmee put it this way:

 

{A} I haven't ever even tried it out but I have already ordered it and am waiting for it to come.

{B} I'll then load it into each of my NN and Kultur pens (each with their own cartridges), and see what happens.

{C} Yes, we all know that dozens or hundreds of inks have been describd as having their own special drawbacks... but... I bet that Noodler's BSB is reported to be the number one among all culprits.

 

Mike

[majorworks]

I've had a new bottle of BSB for a couple of weeks now and finally worked up the courage to fill my Hero 5020 with it yesterday evening. With 21 hours of elapsed time, nothing has melted or fused yet. The jury's still out, of course, but I have hope for it. I do love the color!

 

Having said all that, would I put it in my Safari Vista? No, I would not. That's why I decided to try it in my Hero pen.

[Imzadi]

I've had BSB loaded in my Pelikan M200 for almost a year with no problems. I'm not very good about regular flushing of this pen so I guess I'm admitting I don't treat BSB as a high maintenance ink. I just went 4 weeks without using this pen and it started right up. Reliable pen paired with a beautiful color.

 

YMMV

[pmsalty]

I have used BSB for since it came out in various pens, Aerometric Parker "51" Demi, Hero 616, and a Waterman Phileas, I have never had any issues with the ink other than it stains clear plastic (convertor). No flow issues, no plastic failure, no clogging. My experience.

PMS

[cl0123]

Finally have my first ever ink-nib issue. I have a fine VP nib that has only seen no more than 6 to 8 refills of the venerable BSB.

 

Conditions

• Flush until clear and then left the nib standing on a ball of paper napkins overnight during every refill (well, missed maybe once)
  
• This VP nib saw nothing but BSB only.
  
• Refilled about a week or less ago.
  
• Was just using it at work 3 days ago. It is definitely not close to empty yet.
  
• Stopped working all of a sudden this morning. Tried resting the nib on the notebook to hopefully let the paper sucking the ink out, but to no avail.
  
• Finally, I had to take the nib out and ran it a few times under tab water to "loosen" it.
  

Hope this is just an isolated incident and will not occur frequently. I find the unique and almost "loud" tint of BSB very interesting, especially when using it to mark up a printed document. Looking on the bright side, perhaps it is time to look for something that has a similar tint but less fuss on maintenance.

 

With Aloha,

 

Clarence

[mus]

hi there. well, i know there are lots of stories about BSB and Lamy Pens. When I posted previously I wanted to add my experience, first hand that I put BSB in a lamy al-star and one week later the nib popped off because the plastic that it clips on to had crumbled. This was not a brand new pen, but a very well flushed one. I did a search afterwards on FPN and found all these stories about BSB and Lamy. Then I went to my local stationer, where I bought the BSB and let them know. They apologized said they just had a well respected pen/nib specialist in the store and he had just complained about BSB and some damage he had seen. So take all that for what its worth. Who knows if it the pen, the ink, or a combination. Look I love the color, but will hesitate to use it again. on the other hand, I have an almost full bottle of BSB for anyone who wants live on the wild side...

[lapis]

Well, I ordered BSB as mentioned above two weeks ago, received same and have loaded it into my two least-expensive pens: one NN and two Kulturs.

Nothing yet, all seems fine. Maybe later, we'll see.

 

Mike

[ismellarat]

It is generally decided here that the BSB+Lamy issues were because of defective feeds, and not the ink.

 

Also, nearly all of the clogging issues were because of remnants of previously used inks reacted with the alkaline BSB and caused problems.