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So I've recently joined the ranks of vintage pen lovers with my (new to me) Greg Minuskin stubbed Parker 51. I adore the pen, but when I purchased it, I was strongly cautioned against using Noodler's inks. Noodler's has been in regular rotation for me since I got into fountain pens in a serious way about 5-6 years ago. I've been using it regularly in my Pelikan and Edison pens without problem. Now that I have the Minuskin 51, I have the vintage pen bug and want to buy more, but I'm concerned about inks. I also miss (and quite frankly could use) the water resistance of my old favorite inks. While Googling, I found this: http://www.marcuslink.com/pens/ink/ink-and-ph-levels.htm Now, Mr. Minuskin advises using inks from only pen manufacturers. He specifically says Pelikan and Waterman inks are fine. According to that chart, Pelikan inks are up there on the acidity levels compared to some other options. So if it isn't the pH that eats the sacs of these vintage pens, what is it? Which inks are safe, and which aren't? I can't afford to re-sac all my pens every 6 months.

I went a bit stir-crazy after tendonitis in my wrist first struck my writing hand, and stopped me from wielding a pen painlessly. In the first three months, not only did I spend more money on pens that I couldn't immediately use, I also bought myself a pH meter on eBay (which would only be shipped from the US by way of its Global Shipping Program for some nebulously calculated postage and 'import fees' totalling 75% again of the price of the item itself). It was something I could use without exacerbating my condition, to find out some attribute of each ink, but I didn't stop to think clearly about why I would want to know. The pH meter arrived two months ago, and has been just sitting there in an unopened box all that time. Part of what prompted me was that some folks here seem very keen to know, as if the pH of an ink was important to know. In whatever state of mind back then, I was influenced by the sentiment even though I really don't have a good reason to discover that particular piece of information. Money has been spent on the device, and I'm OK with that, but at least I'm now questioning why I would bother making the effort (in the future) to test the pH of any particular ink, much less every ink I have queued for review. Most of the prospective reasons I can think of why any user of an ink would want to know seem to have to do with risk management and minimisation: Potential of highly acidic or alkaline inks to corrode nibsI trust most, if not all, of my modern (gold or stainless steel, plated or uncoated) to stand up to any commercial fountain pen ink (that is marketed as such), and the wellbeing of my one-and-only vintage pen concerns me not at all.Potential of highly acidic or alkaline inks to damage celluloid or cellulose acetateIs there such potential? I have only one celluloid pen that is of any value, and that is converter-filled, so any risk there should be minimal. I do have three aurolide piston-fillers by Aurora, but I don't recall coming across any claim or complaint that a highly acidic ink has damaged a modern aurolide pen. As for my other piston-fillers — a Pelikan M815 Metal-Striped, a Pelikan M600 Vibrant Orange, a Pelikan M200 Smoky Quartz demonstrator, a PenBBS 309 Cloud and a whole bunch of Wing Sung 3008 pens — the only one I'd 'worry' about because of its value to me is the M600, and I use Pelikan 4001 Blue-Black in it so that ought to be safe?Potential for issues when mixing acidic and basic inksI don't mix inks.Potential of remnants of highly acidic inks to react with bases in pen-flushing and pen-soaking solutionsI habitually flush the nibs, feeds, sections and converters with water 'clean' first before dunking any of them into my ultrasonic cleaning tank or any other bath to soak, so the risk should be minimal, maybe with the exception of Pilot CON-70 converters.Potential of highly acidic inks to damage paper prematurelyI don't really have content to write with a fountain pen that I desperately want to ensure will remain in good condition for the next thirty, forty or fifty years. When I do, I'll look into ISO 12757-2, and perhaps restrict my choice of inks for those applications to the commercial inks that satisfy the relevant sections of that standard for archival document inks.Is there something I missed, such that there may actually be a reason why it would be worth my while to test the pH of an ink and find out, before deciding whether to fill a particular pen with it? ... Just to pre-empt: If I test an ink for its pH because it is of some value for me to know, and I produce an ink review for it, I'll publish the result; there is no reason for me to withhold it. However, if that information is of no value to me, then I won't bother testing it and finding out in the first place, when its potential to damage any pen or nib that I don't have (and won't use) is completely irrelevant and unimportant. Edit: grammar and punctuation

This must've been covered elsewhere (but I couldn't find it) -- I've been using Akkermann ink (mainly Shocking Blue and, recently, Karmozijn) with my Omas celluloid pens -- and, for the most part, had no pen/ink-interaction issues (I hope). Lately, I've also added Iroshizuko kon-peki to my small ink collection. Anyways, today I've looked at the colorverse 'crystal planet' review, and the mentioning of that ink's ph (together with some grim pictures from RichardB's website) made me wonder -- has anyone experienced any problems using these inks (akkerman/iroshizuko/colorverse) with celluloid nitrate pens?

In seeking out archival inks... and scouring various web sites and reading about all sorts of things I'm still left feeling a bit befuddled - as googling can often do to a person. I think the three main issues are: Waterproofness, light fastness (UV resistant), and ph neutrality. What I've realized is that a lot of fountain pen people seem really worried about these things as they relate to their pens. As in ruining their pens with the pigments in waterproof inks, worried about a highly basic or acidic ink ruining their pens. I'm not so concerned about that. I like my pens but more importantly I am concerned about the paper and how long the image will last on the paper. As an artist, I have always been taught to try and make everything archival, and I like the idea that generations from now our creations as a society are still around for others to learn about us etc. Also I think it would be cool if my family had drawings or art work that my great great great grandfather did or something, I would want to check them out. And so I would want my great great great grand kids to be able to see things that I did if they wanted to (which they may not lol). I was originally determined to only buy inks that fit this bill to make sure they were around as long as possible and so that I could paint and use mixed media / ink washes etc.. if I wanted to. So I have some waterproof inks that I'm happy with and can use for this but really I was thinking about it. They don't all need to be waterproof if I'm just drawing. What are the chances my sketchbooks and papers etc.. are going to be submerged in water? I guess my basement could flood - that's a slight concern. The UV resistance is definitely an issue as an image hung on the wall in a house is exposed to light. If in a shop window trying to sell your work, it is exposed to a serious amount of light. So that leaves the 'ph'. It seems that it is pretty important to know the ph of the ink because ink that is say below a ph of 6 and higher than 8, is going to be problematic long term (not for the pen - I don't care so much about the pen). But for the integrity of the image/ drawing/ words/ text etc... on the paper. Is this true ? Also regarding ph. Noodlers and J. Herbin advertise their inks as ph neutral (with some exceptions) but looking at individual ph testing done on this site by members, and on various other websites... It seems the results are inconsistent with the advertising and even with each other sometimes. Sometimes radically different from each other. Ex. Herbin's Bleu Myosotis is reported as ph neutral on their website. But other (well respected in the fountain pen world) independent testers report it at 2.31. There's lots of other differences between other independent testing as well. So, almost done, I figured I could be a bit lengthy in my question on a site dedicated to people who like to write - I assume they don't mind reading a bit either... So what's the deal! What's someone to do ? Who do you believe ? How important is the ph of an ink if you're writing, drawing etc.. on an 'acid free' paper already ? Any thoughts on the ph issue specifically, but feel free to respond to anything else I've mentioned I guess.

Why is Noodler's Baystate Blue advertised as being alkaline? The bottle says ph between 8-9, and various retailers advertise it as being slightly more dangerous to pens due to being basic. Yet, many sites including richardspens.com and a thread here quote the pH as acidic, in the 4-5 range, and when I pH tested my bottle in lab today with a ph probe I got a pH of 2.96, which is 1,088,484 times more acidic than the quoted pH. (pH is measured on a logarithmic scale with a pH value representing a Hydronium Ion Concentration of 10^-pH molar, so pH 5 is 10 times more acidic than ph 6, which is 10 times more acidic than pH 7, and so on). Could Nathan have meant to list 8-9 as the pOH? I can't really think of any other explanation. Edited to say: Even if he did mean pOH, that would only mean a pH range for the ink of 5-6. Measured values have been significantly more acidic than that, by a factor of up to a thousand.

I know this is not an infrequently posted topic, but I am having trouble finding the answers I need. I recently purchased a celluloid pen (Visconti Wall St LE) and I am concerned about maintaining the celluloid as well as possible. Up until now I've been using PR DC Supershow Blue as my standard blue ink, but it is quite saturated and I have no plans to put that in the Visconti. I do need a replacement blue though, so I was curious to see how safe some of my options were. I am aware that Pilot and Sailor inks tend to be quite basic and may be able to damage Celluloid. I am especially concerned given that the material is stacked and any degradation seems like it could cause leaks. Unfortunately, I quite like Iro Kon-Peki and Sailor Tokiwa-Matsu. Should I avoid using them in this pen? I was planning on picking up either some Waterman Serenity/Florida blue or J.Herbin Eclat Saphir. I'm assuming these are both safe to use given their reputation. I was also looking at Omas Blue, but I can't find much on how safe it is (although it does seem to be quite acidic), does anyone have some advice here? I apologize for the rambling post, and thanks for the help!

Hey all, just a few questions: What exactly is 'pH'? To my knowledge it is how acidic an ink is or something? What does it mean if an ink is 'pH neutral'? How does the 'pH' level affect my FP? What is the difference between Iron-Gall and Dye-Based inks' 'pH' levels? And lastly; Can IG inks be mixed with standard (dye-based) inks, just something like Diamine or Waterman? I've seen R&K inks can, but I've also seen many posts about Diamine's Registrar's turning cloggy, even if mixed with less than a drop of other ink. Sorry for the "few" questions, but I am still quite a novice. Thanks, Tom.

I've noticed people saying (often citing Richard Binder's site) that heavily alkaline inks are not to be used in celluloid pens, as they can cause damage or "melt" the body. From what I've seen and searched, there's no real threshold for an ink to be alkaline enough to dissolve celluloid. Some consider pH levels up to 8.0 or 9.0 to be "neutral," but how safe are such pH levels truly for celluloid? Say, if I want to put Iroshizuku or a Sailor ink in a Vacumatic, what can I expect? What about Waterman Red or Noodler's black (assuming I wasn't worrying about staining), which are both slightly alkaline, around high 7s or low 8s? -Bogdan

Dear ink testers, Has anyone tested the pH of the Montblanc Mystery Black fountain pen ink? I don't have litmus paper or pH meter. Thanks,