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One of my favorite papers has been the stuff in Kokuyo Campus notebooks (both grades, 30 pages). Perfect size, and I've been happily using it for years. One day, a Wing Sung 601 filled with Quink Blue started dragging, the ink coming out pale and stingy. I flushed the pen. No difference. It wasn't the pen. Several other pen-ink combos exhibited the same problems: stingy ink flow. I have been using that (and other KC) notebooks with pencil for things like shopping and to-do lists. But I have also recently noticed similar problems with some Clairefontaine and Rhodia papers! As though the coating itself was somehow clogging the tines of the pen. Anyone else have this problem?

My Waterman fountain pen started skipping the beginning of each word a few days ago out of nowhere. The colour it writes has also become clearly lighter (same ink and paper), so the ink flow must be disturbed. I have tried flossing the nib with 0.001 brass shim. I also removed, washed and soaked over night the feed, all to no avail. I'm not sure if it would make sense to floss with 0.002 brass shim, since the pen was wet to begin with. EDIT: I've read about "baby's bottom". But can a pen that is fine out-of-the-box develop that problem?

good morning everyone, i have a nakaya portable (cigar) with a broad stub nib (customized by john mottishaw). beside the yama-budo ink from pilot i also use the kiwaguro nano carbon black. but i have a few problems with it: as it is a thicker ink, it tends to stick in the back part of the converter and i therefore have to give it a shake before writing or even push the filling mechanism in order to get the ink to the feed. do some of you have the same problem? do you have a solution for this? i also have a problem with the filling, especially with the ink bottle. as instructed i turn it upside down and back to get the ink into the mold, but i have to do this multiple times as the mold hardly gets filled enough in order to cover the whole nib (and a small part of the grip section). therefore not enough ink is sucked into the converter. do you use seringes to avoid this problem? thank you in advance for your answers. cheers, nils

Hi. First post. Thanks in advance for any help.I'm having trouble with a new Kaweco Sport fountain pen with fine nib. I received it brand new this past weekend. It worked well at first and I enjoyed using it for a few days. I used it today for a few hours with no issues. However, it suddenly stopped writing well. (I was using the same paper, same conditions, etc. no changes. The pen hasn't been dropped or misused or anything. I'm the only one to have used it.) The flow, which until this point had been steady, is now very dry and often no ink comes out. This happens especially if I stop writing with the cap off, even just briefly, but it can happen in the middle of penning a word. At times the ink will flow as it used to, but most of the time it's scratchy, dry and sporadic (if flowing at all). Initially, I thought the pen was low on or out of ink, but the cartridge (Kaweco, came with pen; the first and only cartridge to go in the pen) was still 1/2 full. No trapped air or anything that I could see, but I swapped in another Kaweco cartridge just in case. But, still had the same problems. I can get it to start writing again by moistening the tip of the nib, but it doesn't last. In short, the pen worked well for 4 days or so, and then the performance suddenly tanked. I have other fountain pens (though this is my first Kaweco) but I've not experienced anything like this.Any thoughts and/or suggestions? Thanks very much.

Hi, new girl here, I have a lovely brand new Parker Premier and the ink flow is shockingly bad - have attached a sample. Have now cleaned the pen and changed to a blue cartridge but it's still awful. The shop tells me to post it back to them but I'd prefer to see if it's fixable. It's a gorgeous pink gold pen and I'd like to keep it if I can. I wonder if anyone will even see this message?! Best Jill M.

Hello All, I have recently purchased a Waterman 52 1/2V fountain pen with a flexible nib and have restored it to good condition. However, I find the flow to the nib to much too wet. Both the hairlines and the broad lines pool with ink, and sometimes the broad lines will be nearly black when using my diamine midnight ink. The pen is practically incapable of writing on cheap paper due to excessive feathering. Is there a way to reduce the flow? I am sorry if there were other resources with this information, but I could only find information relating to reducing the ink flow to a firm nib, which included adjusting the tine gap. Obviously, this would not prove very effective when the tines flex. Also, another minor question. I have aligned the tines on the nib when the nib is off the pen, but when placed into the section with the feed, the feed pushes unevenly on one tine, slightly misaligning it. It still writes, as the issue is small, but will I need to sand the feed down to be more even if I want this problem alleviated? Thanks for the help, Allan