Noodler's Voiding Pen Warranty?

[mstone]

@mstone: Ah, that's a fine distinction.

 

It's a pretty important distinction, and on the other side is quite a lot of FUD.

 

What, exactly, would cause you to send a pen in for service? (Especially in the 2 or 3 years that Lamy or Waterman are giving you?) To avoid raising moderator ire I won't go into specifics (you can look for them) but suffice it to say that outside of some know problems with BSB there simply aren't any credible reports of ordinary Noodler's ink causing new pens to break. Clogging? Sure, maybe--but you can have the same problem with badly maintained Lamy Blue-Black and Lamy doesn't have to cover that under warranty either. But parts falling off the pen? You're not going to get into a pitched fight with Lamy over fixing that because you once had a snort of Noodler's Black. It would cost them more to have the fight than to fix the pen. When we start seeing reports of people being turned away in droves, then we can have a different discussion. (Just having someone give a lecture on the importance of using the company ink after doing the work doesn't really count.)

[Scrawler]

Some pens may be made of materials that are susceptible to damage by highly acidic inks. As a precaution I only use iron gall inks in pens with gold nibs. Some inks will clog most pens it is put in if left to dry. I have clogged pens with Herbin 1670, which while a delightful colour, I find to be one of the worst behaved inks I have used. The other inks I will not use anymore are Chinese and Japanese micro-carbon inks. They are lovely when the pen is first inked, but if you leave a pen with it in, it crusts the innards up. Another thing to look out for, as far as clogging is concerned is inadvertently mixing different kinds of ink, due to poor flushing between fillings. I suspect this is less likely to happen if the different colours are the same kind of ink, made by the same manufacturer. If you are prone to poor pen hygeine, then following the manufacturers advice to only use their inks, may have merit.

[SamCapote]

...

3) the manufacturer will perform the necessary forensics to determine you have used the wrong ink

...

 

The cost of a legitimate forensic analysis would cost more than the retail price of 99% of all fountain pens.

[Jimmy James]

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3) the manufacturer will perform the necessary forensics to determine you have used the wrong ink

...

 

The cost of a legitimate forensic analysis would cost more than the retail price of 99% of all fountain pens.

Exactly. Let's say somebody sends in a pen to Montblanc that has been used with some non-MB ink. Unless the ink is some color they don't sell like pink, they'd be very hard pressed to establish it isn't their ink or some mixture thereof. If the pen is ruined by something like India ink, that's going to be apparent. If whatever ink this is has seriously degraded the "precious resin" in a way their inks never do, that's going to be apparent. If the pen is just clogged up and honestly could have been corrected by the user, they're not going to spend a lot of resources -- they'll just disassemble and pop it in an ultrasonic cleaner or what have you.

 

I sent my wife's computer in to Dell because the hinge cracked due to no misuse on our part. I sent it with an AC adapter that I bought from eBay that turned out not to be a genuine Dell part. They didn't send the computer back claiming this counterfeit adapter caused the hinge problem. That would expose them to a customer service black eye, possible litigation, or at least a hassle. Instead, they fixed the computer and included a brand new genuine Dell adapter in place of the one we sent and a nice note saying the adapter I sent was not genuine and here's a genuine one for my convenience.

[dweit]

None of the above addresses the question of why such an experienced and well regarded fountain pen restorer like Rick Propas would have a warranty policy that explicitly excludes Noodlers' inks. I would think his exclusion is based on his experiences while repairing and restoring pens, and is not motivated by any desire or need to sell a particular brand of inks. I personally have not asked him directly about that, and a quick search here on FPN did not bring me any results. Seems like that is where these questions should go? (Kcat, perhaps you could direct us to any prior discussions here on FPN by Mr. Propas or other restorers on the subject).

[KCat]

i specifically asked folks not to get into the "such-and-such killed my pen discussion" and it looks like this thread is going the way of all the threads before it meanwhile those in the know have given their input. If anyone has any new data on the subject (as in, information from manufacturers such as that sellers would have encountered or they have heard directly upon having warranty work done) please let me know and I will allow them to add it to the thread. Until then, the thread is now closed.

[KCat]

None of the above addresses the question of why such an experienced and well regarded fountain pen restorer like Rick Propas would have a warranty policy that explicitly excludes Noodlers' inks. I would think his exclusion is based on his experiences while repairing and restoring pens, and is not motivated by any desire or need to sell a particular brand of inks. I personally have not asked him directly about that, and a quick search here on FPN did not bring me any results. Seems like that is where these questions should go? (Kcat, perhaps you could direct us to any prior discussions here on FPN by Mr. Propas or other restorers on the subject).

 

Mr. Propas also voids warranty with the use of PR inks. AS I noted earlier in the thread, this ha been discussed at length. A simple Google search as earlier described brings up his pages on the first page of the search. I have not looked for this discussion here on FPN though I can do so later.

Edited June 11, 2011 by KCat