New From J.herbin: Cleaning Solution For Fountain Pen

[SamCapote]

Jean Elie, how many treatments does the small do? Is it supposed to be diluted in a cup with water to get up into the ink sac or converter?

[Epictete92]

Jean Elie, how many treatments does the small do? Is it supposed to be diluted in a cup with water to get up into the ink sac or converter?

 

Hi Sam,

 

No according to Herbin, you do not have to dilute it, the idea is to get the product mainy in the feed so it does not need to get up and to fill the ink sac or converter.

I have try to use the product on one pen like this so it remains products in the bottle but the feedback of the people will be helpfull.

Thank you

[arz]

Thank you Jean Elie, I got my package the other day! I have not needed to try the cleaning solution yet because I had 2 clean pens waiting for the new ink I bought from you. I'll update with my results when I try it out!

[liapuyat]

I just got my bottle (I won it after retweeting Jean's announcement). Will try it this weekend. I hope it's reusable...

[Pen Nut]

Would be interested to hear how this performed. Any of the "6" like to post a review??

[atypical]

A package containing 15ml of J. Herbin's "Nettoyant Pour Stylo" was sent to me by Jean Elie from Paperandco.

 

http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h346/diokan/Herbin%20Cleaner/herbin_1.jpg

 

The instructions included with the cleaner are essentially to fill the emptied pen with cleaner, let it soak for 5 minutes and then rinse with cold water.

To test the effectiveness of the cleaner, I decided to find out how well it can remove dried ink from a plastic surface.

As a fairly unscientific test, a total of 8 inks were deposited on 6 strips of polystyrene plastic.

 

Inks used:

1. J. Herbin Perle Noire

2. Pelikan 4001 Royal Blue

3. Waterman Florida Blue

4. Montblanc Blue-Black

5. A black ink

6. A purple/blue ink

7. Sailor Kiwa Guro

8. Platinum Carbon Black

 

The ink was applied using cotton swabs, trying to ensure as even a distribution as possible, which, due to the tendency of the plastic to repel the ink, is not that easy.

The strips were subsequently dried for 24 hours at 26 – 32 °C. Note that ink sample 5 (and possibly 7) was not fully dry at this time.

 

http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h346/diokan/Herbin%20Cleaner/herbin_2.jpg

(Samples after drying)

 

I assume that a pen will be flushed with water before using this solution. To simulate this, the samples were first of all washed with running water for 1 minute.

This immediately removed the J. Herbin Perle Noire (except for a faint yellow stain), the Pelikan Royal Blue and the Waterman Florida Blue but left the others essentially untouched.

The samples were then immersed in water for a period of 24 hours. No obvious cleaning effect on the remaining inks was observed.

 

http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h346/diokan/Herbin%20Cleaner/herbin_3.jpg

(Samples after 24 h immersion in water)

 

The 6 samples where then each placed in a Petri dish and subjected for 5 minutes, under gentle agitation, to the following cleaning solutions.

A. None at this point.

B. J. Herbin - Nettoyant pour stylo

C. Household ammonia + water, diluted 1 + 9

D. Rotring - Technical pen cleaner

E. Home-made cleaner (full strength)

F. Highly alkaline cleaning solution. Not for fountain pens.

 

http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h346/diokan/Herbin%20Cleaner/herbin_4.jpg

(Samples after being subjected to cleaning solutions)

 

Observations:

B. J Herbin. Works very well. Manages to remove a substantial amount of ink 6 and Platinum Carbon Black.

C. Ammonia 1+9. No observable effect.

D. Rotring. Similar to the cleaner from J. Herbin

E. Home-made. Removes some of ink 6. No effect on the carbon inks. Works better on the Montblanc Blue-Black than the others.

F. Alkaline cleaner. Works very well on ink 6. Has little or no effect on the other inks

 

Further testing :

Sample C (ammonia 1+9) was submerged for another 5 minutes in undiluted household ammonia. Again no effect was observed .

Sample A was subjected to a battery of cleaning solutions in an attempt to remove all ink:

- Winsor & Newton airbrush cleaning fluid => removes some of ink 6

- Methanol => no effect

- Naphtha => no effect

- Ultrasonic cleaning, 7 minutes, 1% solution of a general purpose ultrasonic cleaning solution (Emag EM-080) => removes most of the ink with some of the carbon inks still remaining.

- Ultrasonic cleaning, 7 minutes, Rotring technical pen cleaner => removes a bit more of the carbon inks

 

http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h346/diokan/Herbin%20Cleaner/herbin_5.jpg

 

(Samples A and C after further testing)

 

Conclusions:

 

Effectiveness

The cleaner works surprisingly well.

It seems at least equal to and perhaps even slightly better than the Rotring technical pen cleaner that I normally use for difficult cases.

More testing would be required to find out which one is best.

Packaging

The amount of 15ml seems rather small.

A possible advantage of 15 ml bottles is that you could buy e.g. a set of four and use them in a fixed sequence when cleaning a pen.

The first bottle would then be the most polluted and the last one would contain almost clean solution.

When the first bottle gets too polluted, discard it and add a new, clean, bottle at the end of the cleaning chain.

 

Cleaning time

A cleaning time of 5 minutes seems fairly short.

During testing, I had the impression that the cleaning solution was still removing ink at the end of the 5 minute period.

 

Other observations

- Ammonia seems to have little or no effect. Perhaps the cleaning time was too short.

- The use of an ultrasonic cleaner vastly improves the effectiveness of cleaning solutions.

- No cleaner at all seems to be required to remove the more conventional inks.

- The tenacity of the iron gall ink was a bit of a surprise.

- Do not let carbon inks dry in a pen. They will be difficult to remove.

[Pen Nut]

Great review. Thanks for posting

[arz]

Wow, fabulous work! I will try it in a pen soon and report how that turns out, but I am sure it won't compare with your thorough testing. I bought the scabiosa iron gall ink from Jean Elie and have it in a Lamy pen, so that's what I'll try. You should post those results elsewhere on the forum, too, (if you haven't already) where they will also be appreciated!

[Epictete92]

Hello,

 

wow wow wow wow !

That's a really tremendous work !

Thank you very much for the time you spent on this and the sharing, it's really to have member to really test products.

Best regards

Jean Elie

[vannesspen]

Hello from Paris,

 

I came this morning to Herbin factory to pick up one of their brand new products.

 

http://i483.photobucket.com/albums/rr195/penandco/JHerbinnettoyantpourstylos.jpg

 

It is called "Nettoyant pour stylo", probably the name will be different for foreign markets. Instructions are in french, english and german ( lol if a spanish fpn contact me , it will be great to get it in spanish )

 

It is a little bottle of 15 ml, so forget to dip you nib in it.

 

To use it you have to put the solution in a cup, then to put your nib and feed in it, to fill your pen a little and to wait for about 5 mn.

 

Then clean the pen with cold water and that's all !

 

Herbin told me that most of the components are natural.

 

i have tested it on vintage Duofold and it seems to write better.

 

I am ready to offer 6 samples of this products to make people try it, i would like to have a better idea of it so ... just reply to this post, saying "i want it " lol and the four first answers will be the lucky ones :-)

 

And if you to get this product, you will find it here : Herbin cleaning solution for fountain pen

 

If you have any question do not hesitate to contact

 

Have a nice week end

Jean Elie

[vannesspen]

If you still have any cleaner Vanness Pens would be interested in this product!

thanks

[Epictete92]

If you still have any cleaner Vanness Pens would be interested in this product!

thanks

pm sent

[vistafan]

Just an update.

I received this and decided to use it to clean my Lamy Safari; I poured out a little of the solution into a small container and left my nib to sit in the solution for five minutes. After this I rinsed the pen with water. I noticed that it cleaned the pen really well and even noticed a difference when I refilled it with ink. My Lamy Safari wrote a nice wet line and the ink flow was good (it usually is, but I noticed some improvement).

 

Thank you Epictete92 for allowing me to test the product.

[efchem]

I finally got to using mine. I had pulled a nib and feed from an old Omas that had dried ink in it and the old ink on the bottom of the nib was caked on. I soaked them in water and it did not do much so I decided to finally try the solution. I did leave it overnight in the solution and I have to say that the nib now sparkles. There was no ink to speak of on the nib. This product seems like a real winner and hope that it is available in the states but in a bigger bottle.

[arz]

I also have finally tried mine out! I had R&K scabiosa ink in a Lamy AL Star and had left it for a few days once the ink ran out before getting around to cleaning it. I rinsed with water a few times and drew up a bit of the solution, let it sit for 5 minutes as recommended, and then flushed the fluid into a small cup with some water. I drew up and expunged the diluted solution a few more times and then dried the pen. Very clean as a result!

 

Thank you Jean Elie for letting me try this product. Since I am sometimes bad about flushing pens for a few days after they run out of ink, as in this case, I am sure I will be putting it to great use.

Edited December 1, 2011 by arz

[Epictete92]

I also have finally tried mine out! I had R&K scabiosa ink in a Lamy AL Star and had left it for a few days once the ink ran out before getting around to cleaning it. I rinsed with water a few times and drew up a bit of the solution, let it sit for 5 minutes as recommended, and then flushed the fluid into a small cup with some water. I drew up and expunged the diluted solution a few more times and then dried the pen. Very clean as a result!

 

Thank you Jean Elie for letting me try this product. Since I am sometimes bad about flushing pens for a few days after they run out of ink, as in this case, I am sure I will be putting it to great use.

 

 

Hi all thank you very much for your feedback, and i will then let Herbin know that they did a great job with this product.

Thank you again

Best regards

[hovea]

Using tap water, I was having difficulty cleaning the last traces of Diamine Imperial Purple from my Waterman Charleston nib/feed/converter. The J Herbin "Nettoyant pour stylo" worked beautifully, and now the pieces are sparkling and ready for another inky drink. I would like to extend my thanks to Jean Elie for providing a sample.