Diamine Registrar's Ink

[Fuddlestack]

Excellent review and a spiffy heading to your sample. Thanks!

[gro]

Good review. But what about the archival properties? Wont even low concentration of gall acids have effects on paper in the long run?

[Possum Hill]

Good review. But what about the archival properties? Wont even low concentration of gall acids have effects on paper in the long run?

That question has concerned folks for a long time. Forty Centuries of Ink (and also here ) has some interesting information about the search for long lasting paper/ink combinations in the last chapters and a lot of other fascinating information in the rest.

[wallylynn]

Pharmacist has posted some chemical explanation info in a few threads

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/index.php?/topic/165990-ink-fades-out/

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/index.php?/topic/124467-ink-recipes-mixed-inks-homemade-inks/page__st__300

 

The archival quality question comes up every month, if not more often in Inky Thoughts. Here's last month's:

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/index.php?/topic/159246-best-archival-quality-ink/

 

 

And thanks for the review! DRI is next on my list to get.

[Possum Hill]

And thanks for the review! DRI is next on my list to get.

Don't wait too long. I got a bottle from Goulet Pens a few days ago and filled a couple pens yesterday. It's fun just watching the color change.

 

The appearance differs quite a bit between my Safari with 1.1 mm italic nib and my Reform 1745, looking darker from the narrower nib, but with some nice shading from both.

[hari317]

Anyone have a pen recommendation for this ink? I have a bottle and am having a heck of a time getting the stuff to flow in my pens.

 

<snip>

 

ETA: I do have a rather substantial amount of sediment at the bottom of my bottle. Is this "normal"?

 

I bought the 100ml bottle directly from Diamine and yes, the sedimentation is quite significant in my bottle. It is kept in a dark closet capped tightly. Due to this sedimentation, presently I use it only in my Ebonite ED pens with simple feeds and steel nibs adjusted for super wet flow, no corrosion observed yet. I will be very cautious while using this ink in my pens equipped with intricately finned feeders. I was using it for a while in my Vintage Celluloid 144 but discontinued it for fear of sediment related clogging. Other than the sedimentation, this is my most favorite IG ink, excellent dark shade once it dries on paper. Very waterfast and light fast.

 

My other bottles of IG inks like Salix/Sacbiosa/MB Blue black have not shown sediments yet, but none are as waterfast as Diamine RI.

 

Best,

Hari

[mori45]

Thanks for the review. The ink looks like it's got a nice smoky quality to it. Definitely going on my list of inks to try.

[soapy]

good review thanks ive been looking at this ink but was worried with all the warnings

[Flaxmoore]

That question has concerned folks for a long time. Forty Centuries of Ink (and also here ) has some interesting information about the search for long lasting paper/ink combinations in the last chapters and a lot of other fascinating information in the rest.

 

A review of the various reviews of Registrar's brought this comment to my attention, and I thought I'd add my thoughts.

 

I've read Forty Centuries of Ink, and while I agree Carvalho has a lot of good points (particularly the transient nature of a lot of inks of the era) I find his insistence on iron gall a little strange.

 

His primary reason for insistence on its permanence seems to be that the iron inks have lasted for centuries, and in that he's correct, but there have been literal thousands of manuscripts lost because of poorly-made iron gall inks eating their way through the paper- some of the works of Beethoven are so deteriorated that it's as if the notes were written using a scalpel rather than a pen.

 

Now, don't get me wrong. I love iron gall, especially DRI. It's easily my second-most used ink, after either Parker washable blue or Sheaffer Blue. It's one of my prescription inks, since removing it from a prescription pad is going to either destroy the paper or alter it so much that a pharmacist will refuse to fill it.

 

I just find Carvalho's insistence on iron as the be-all, end-all ultimate ink a bit strange. That closes the book, in a sense, by saying that the chase is over. It is possible one of the 21st Century wonder inks may be the perfect ink, but the one thing they don't have is time to prove that fact. Maybe Kung Te Cheng disintegrates the paper after a decade. Maybe Monteverde Documental vanishes after a year.

 

I'm reminded of when I was working construction, actually. With our work trucks, they'd buy a new one, and pull out the motor. A brand new motor, and they'd set it aside. In would go an iron-block 351 cubic inch V8. It didn't matter if the new motor was more efficient (it was not uncommon for the new motor to have economy of 24mpg, and the old one put in 14), lighter, or anything else. It was a technology that they didn't trust. That was proven out more than once with recalls and the like, while that 70 year old tech kept turning. I finally convinced them to keep the newer more efficient motor in with some of the new trucks, and it seems to have helped, but the Eco-Boost doesn't have that decades-long history.

 

Carvalho seems to have been like that old mechanic for the family business. The old was what worked.

 

But that doesn't mean the book is closed.

[Honeybadgers]

For me, iron galls are the be-all for bad paper. Nothing seems to do as good a job short of maybe noodlers x-feather. And I am writing in the rain all the time as a paramedic, so I need something waterproof that dries instantly and doesn't run enough to be illegible when rain hits it.

I keep trying other inks and nothing ever does the job as well as registrars. An alternative that comes damn close is the new iron gall blue black TWSBI ink. it's very, VERY near to registrars, a little less aggressive, feathers a tiny bit, still dries quickly (though not as instantly as registrars) and is a smidge more blue with more shading and a hair wetter. I've been using registrars daily for several years and have been trying the TWSBI alternative since I like that it's half the price with a far, FAR better bottle (TWSBI might actually have the best bottle in the business now with the diamond 20 cap on it and the deeeep ink cup)

 

Modernity does have benefits. Noodlers bulletproof and warden inks are generally considered to be far tougher and longer lasting than iron galls. Nathan Tardiff honestly seems to be the only person aggressively pursuing very technically advanced inks, and challenging them to be defeated with things like lasers and various solvents. But they all either feather or dry really slowly for me, who needs instant dry, waterproof, no feathering, and not much more. Or X feather - which is perfect except for being a slow drying smear-monster on coated paper as a tradeoff for being amazing on cheap paper.

 

But there's also something to be said for old and reliable tech. to Flax's point, I'm a paramedic, and we have so many problems with modern engines, be they ford, GM, mercedes, v6, v8, v10, gas or diesel. They're just so highly tuned for efficiency and power (the new generation of 5-6.3L v8 diesels make something like 800-900 freaking lb-ft of torque. WHY.) that they're no longer the overbuilt and under-stressed (old ford 7.3's made in the 300lb-ft neighborhood) beasts they were. We have old ford powerstroke 7.3 rigs with a million miles on them. The cabs are trashed. The boxes are ancient. They just stay in service because the engines are unkillable. When they break down, it's the stuff that only costs $60 to replace. The turbochargers are ancient low boot low spool things made from old melted down tuna cans and made to outlast the dinosaurs. The modern stuff sure gets a proper 15mpg to the 7.3's 8mpg, but reliability is paramount in what we do, so having a rig that needs major, major service every 10-15k miles versus every 50-90k miles is far less advantageous. Right now we have three mercedes sprinters down at my base that we just can't afford to fix all at once because they need 10k in work. So I've been stuck in a 7.3 powered ford for weeks with ten times the miles of my sprinter, and it just doesn't stop running. Back when I worked primary 911 in the rural mountainous part of King County where I needed to get up 20 mile long 4wd tracks, I fought like hell to have a 7.3 powered rig instead of a modern mercedes one. Because I knew the 7.3 would always get me home.

Edited July 6, 2020 by Honeybadgers

[dave321]

in my opinion the best iron gall ink out there is

 

kwz Blue-Black

 

it behaves much better in the pen than diamine's Registrars ink.

 

KWZ BLUE-BLACK every time

[Honeybadgers]

I've found my KWZ iron galls to all feather quite a lot for IG inks, but I have only tried three (gold, green gold, and turquoise)

[silverlifter]

I've found my KWZ iron galls to all feather quite a lot for IG inks, but I have only tried three (gold, green gold, and turquoise)

 

Give IG BLue Black a shot. It is Konrad's "classic" IG ink; the others are all, on a sliding scale from Blue #1 to the rainbow colours, modern interpretations. NIce inks, but moving further away from iron gall towards mostly dye-based.

[Flaxmoore]

For me, iron galls are the be-all for bad paper. Nothing seems to do as good a job short of maybe noodlers x-feather. And I am writing in the rain all the time as a paramedic, so I need something waterproof that dries instantly and doesn't run enough to be illegible when rain hits it.

 

I keep trying other inks and nothing ever does the job as well as registrars. An alternative that comes damn close is the new iron gall blue black TWSBI ink. it's very, VERY near to registrars, a little less aggressive, feathers a tiny bit, still dries quickly (though not as instantly as registrars) and is a smidge more blue with more shading and a hair wetter. I've been using registrars daily for several years and have been trying the TWSBI alternative since I like that it's half the price with a far, FAR better bottle (TWSBI might actually have the best bottle in the business now with the diamond 20 cap on it and the deeeep ink cup)

 

Modernity does have benefits. Noodlers bulletproof and warden inks are generally considered to be far tougher and longer lasting than iron galls. Nathan Tardiff honestly seems to be the only person aggressively pursuing very technically advanced inks, and challenging them to be defeated with things like lasers and various solvents. But they all either feather or dry really slowly for me, who needs instant dry, waterproof, no feathering, and not much more. Or X feather - which is perfect except for being a slow drying smear-monster on coated paper as a tradeoff for being amazing on cheap paper.

 

But there's also something to be said for old and reliable tech. to Flax's point, I'm a paramedic, and we have so many problems with modern engines, be they ford, GM, mercedes, v6, v8, v10, gas or diesel. They're just so highly tuned for efficiency and power (the new generation of 5-6.3L v8 diesels make something like 800-900 freaking lb-ft of torque. WHY.) that they're no longer the overbuilt and under-stressed (old ford 7.3's made in the 300lb-ft neighborhood) beasts they were. We have old ford powerstroke 7.3 rigs with a million miles on them. The cabs are trashed. The boxes are ancient. They just stay in service because the engines are unkillable. When they break down, it's the stuff that only costs $60 to replace. The turbochargers are ancient low boot low spool things made from old melted down tuna cans and made to outlast the dinosaurs. The modern stuff sure gets a proper 15mpg to the 7.3's 8mpg, but reliability is paramount in what we do, so having a rig that needs major, major service every 10-15k miles versus every 50-90k miles is far less advantageous. Right now we have three mercedes sprinters down at my base that we just can't afford to fix all at once because they need 10k in work. So I've been stuck in a 7.3 powered ford for weeks with ten times the miles of my sprinter, and it just doesn't stop running. Back when I worked primary 911 in the rural mountainous part of King County where I needed to get up 20 mile long 4wd tracks, I fought like hell to have a 7.3 powered rig instead of a modern mercedes one. Because I knew the 7.3 would always get me home.

Totally valid point, and one I certainly understand from a mechanical perspective.

 

When the newer Ecoboost stuff started coming out (claiming a turbo V6 was as good as a standard V8) we refused. It's a construction business. Our requirements are that we can run 75mph up I-75, throw 1500-2000 pounds of steel in the back, and haul it and two guys back down 75 at 75mph to go install. Downtime needs to be measured in hours per year, not hours per month.

 

It did lead to some interesting opportunities, though. I had an utter piece of garbage early-90s Ford Taurus where the motor was going bad. One of those newer V8s fit just fine. Mated it to a 5-liter Mustang transmission, and I was the only guy out there with a Taurus that could run 11 second quarter-miles.

 

But there's a world of difference between something I was playing around with and something that lives and livelihoods depend on.

[MissCellany]

I agree with honeybadgers, I LOVE my bottle of Twsbi Blue Black. Even with my broad nibbed Visconti, it doesn't feather or bleed on copy paper. It's ridiculous, and the bottles are phenominal.