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The "Bad" series are Nathan Tardif's response to a challenge he had running - remove his bulletproof black from paper without destroying it, and win a prize. It took an MIT student and a laser, but it was done. So the new inks, dubbed "bad" are now laser proof, as well as bulletproof (waterproof, bleach/ammonia proof, archival) It's also just a great, well behaved ink. The flow is excellent, the color is deeply saturated, there's very little shading, no sheen, very little feathering in a very wet F on the worst copy paper I have ever seen, almost no bleedthrough on said paper, and little to no showthrough. Dry times are instant on copy paper, average to quick on Rhodia. Like almost all Noodlers inks, no sheen or special color effects on good paper. The only downside (and this simply is unavoidable) is that on Rhodia, water will lift a little bit of the surface ink off, causing mild smearing, though the original lines where pen touched paper are still perfectly legible. On copy paper, almost nothing happens. Are there snazzier blue-blacks with sheen and shading and all that jazz? Sure. But they won't outlast your grandchildren! When you need a professional colored ink that stands out just enough on documents as to indicate an original signature without bleeding or feathering like mad on whatever paper it's on (provided you use an F or EF nib) this blue-black has you covered. I've got an M nib coming in the mail so I can run the gamut of "everyday" nibs that you could use. The lamy EF-B are all quite wet, so look at the 1.1 for what a dry nib would look like.

Hey there community! For all you newer folks out there wondering about how Noodler's Ink's Bad Blue Heron works in a Pilot Metropolitan (F) and Lamy Al-Star (EF). Here's the story. YMMV. A while ago I made a posting asking about how to pair Noodler's Ink's Bad Blue Heron successfully with my Lamy Al-Stars (EF) and what nib replacement I should use. I was running into major flow and start issues at the time with the EF nibs; Bad Blue Heron would often dry on the nib and cause the pen to fail to start immediately upon touching paper, and the overall flow through the pen after I got it to write was intermittent at best. I was not amused. After asking this great community for advice and searching the forums I learned several things: 1. Bad Blue Heron is not a well behaved ink, and what I experienced was a common thing for some other people. It's a hit or miss when inking up pens with this ink. 2. The Jinhao X750 is a sufficiently cheap beater pen that can come completely apart for cleaning and replacing the nibs, and so is a perfect candidate for testing inks in. It comes in a #6 M nib (to my knowledge), so you can replace the nib to any other sizing (e.g. F) so long as it remains a #6 nib. 3. Noodler's Ink's Bulletproof Black seems to be well behaved in many pens. So what I did was flushed out my Lamy Al-Star using Bad Blue Heron and inked it up with Bulletproof Black and never looked back. Problems on the Lamy front solved. But as far as the Bad Blue Heron was concerned I didn't want to waste the bottle of ink so I contemplated ordering the Jinhao X750 to test it out in. However, with a perfectly good Pilot Metropolitan (F) lying around and my impatience getting the better of me, I inked up the Pilot Metropoitan (F) with Bad Blue Heron instead. I rolled the dice and I was rewarded (YMMV and do not try with expensive pens). It so happens that Noodler's Ink's Bad Blue Heron works very well in my Pilot Metropolitan (F)! Bad Blue Heron's behavior in the Pilot Metropolitan was akin to the proprietary Pilot inks that I initially bought with the pen. I've been using my Pilot Metropolitan (F) with Bad Blue Heron for the last three weeks and the ink's behavior is consistent and predictable. When I touch pen to paper (whether the paper is cheap and absorbant or glossy and smooth) the ink flows immediately. The line layed down by this pen and ink combination is crisp and well approximated in the less absorbant papers, and on very cheap absorbant paper (writing pads from Costco) it fuzzies up just a tad (but not enough to ruin your writing). And throughout your writing session, there is no discernable flow issues as you write page to page. As a caveat however I must admit that if you leave the pen uncapped for a good while, the ink will characteristically dry a bit on the nib. But even after purposely doing this, my Pilot Metropolitan (F) still began to write almost immediately after touching paper. Also, you will experience the same nib creep that you get in other pens with this particular set up as well. Otherwise, the Pilot Metropolitan (F) and Bad Blue Heron pairing has been a stable workhorse of mine now and will continue to stay that way into the foreseeable future. Let me know what your experiences are with this and other Noodler's Inks. And feel free to add any information you think pertinent. - Thanks for reading, MPenn TL; DR = The Pilot Metropolitan (F) and Bad Blue Heron combo works well and writes great! YMMV

Hello everyone, So I have tried inking my Lamy Al-Star (EF) with Noodler's Bad Blue Heron ink, and I have been running into what I can only describe as some flow problems. What I am experiencing is ink drying or perhaps congealing at the tip of the nib, and it makes it so that the pen needs to be stroked a few times before the ink starts to flow again. And even after I start writing the ink seems hard to get out and flowing easily. I am new to fountain pens and I would like some advice on whether or not I need to get a larger nib or do something about the ink to remedy this issue. Thanks a lot, MPenn P.S. And if anyone has had experience with how Bad Blue Heron flows and works in a Pilot Metropolitan (F) I would love to hear about it as well!

I LOVE Noodler's Baystate Blue. In my humble opinion, it is the best color of blue for fountain pens. My only complaints about it are: It is not fully bulletproof.It might not be eternal meaning it might not archival nor fade resistant.It bleeds through most of my papers I use including my checks.Rectifying the above are very important to me. I would not be ashamed to try a different brand of ink, but I do really like Noodler's products so I guess I am a Noodler's fanboy I am thinking about ordering a bottle of Noodler's Bad Blue Heron which appears to have what Baystate Blue is missing above other than it is not quite the same color. Noodler's Upper Ganges also might be an alternative, but it does not appear to be as bright as Bad Blue Heron. Noodler's Luxury Blue looks just like Upper Ganges to me, but will glow under UV light which I find kind of cool, but it is not important to me. Noodler's Periwinkle does what Luxury Blue does and kind of looks brighter, but the stock image on the Noodler's Ink website makes it hard to tell. Noodler's Polar Blue looks like Bad Blue Heron with the added possible benefits of being freeze-resistant and lubing piston-fill pens. So my question is what comes close to Baystate Blue that is bulletproof. eternal, and doesn't bleed through most papers? I did a search and found this thread about this subject, but it lists alternatives which are not really pertinent to my question above and things have changed in 6 years: https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/185947-baystate-blue-alternative/ THANKS!

Hi everyone, Bad Blue Heron is in my opinion an excellent ink. Well behaved, great color and bulletproof. Except the strong odor, which is downright terrible, this is easily one of my top inks. The image is color corrected with ColorChecker Passport. Enjoy! - Daniel

I just ordered a bottle of Bad Blue Heron from pure pens.co.uk I wanted the wonderful Prime of the Commons however this is out of stock and they cannot get a hold of Noodlers to get more of it. I have a 2ml sample of this ink and love it. Compared to Tsuki-yo it is really a good colour. I hope the Bad Blue Heron has the same effect on me! Your thoughts anyone?