How Long Does Ink Last?

[overlander]

I am considering getting into the fountain pen hobby, and I am wondering how long bottled ink lasts. Specifically, to be used for primarily school notes and homework, with a fine or extra fine lamy nib (if that makes a difference). How many milliliters of ink do you guys usually go though with schoolwork? I realize that there are a lot of variables at play here, but a rough estimate would be very helpful to me. Thanks

[discopig]

I write and sketch daily with my pens and I use about 1.5-2ml of ink per week. Ink lasts a long time. I have 7 ink bottles here and none is even halfway gone. I do use flex nibs though, so that uses a lot more ink. If you're going to be using XF/F nibs I'd be surprised if you used more than 1ml per week.

Edited April 22, 2014 by discopig

[hungh]

I find that I can run on one fill of ink for the whole week (and often longer).
Admittedly, I'm using a TWSBI 580 EF and they do hold a lot...plus its an EF so less ink.
I'm really not sure how much it holds but I'd say about 2ml?

I haven't even gone through one bottle yet and I've been taking notes with FPs for about a year or so.

[Beckwith]

I concur with discopig and hungh r.e. the volume of ink used in writing. But also keep in mind that if you leave a pin inked up and don't use it for a while the ink can evaporate a bit.

[casualmerlinconstant]

Depends on what size nib you have. I use Extra-Fines, and lived on one bottle of ink for a year and a half. Still not even half way through that bottle yet. (Admittedly its a 90 mL bottle, so at a rough guess I went through about 40mL in a year?). Basically if you buy one bottle of ink, you won't have to think about it in a very long time. (good luck resisting trying different colours though)

[fledermaus89]

I used Pelikan EF nibs while at school and through the 4 years of about a-page-a-day note-taking I used ~100ml of black, ~60ml of turquoise and ~10ml of violet. One fill lasted a very long time for me.

Edited April 22, 2014 by fledermaus89

[whalebiologist]

I'm a neurotic med student and I use about ~1ml of ink a day. I primarily buy 80ml bottles of Diamine ink. Even burning through ink a bottle still lasts me forever.

[h.farmawi]

Nib size.. it do makes a difference, F or EF Nib pens last longer the M nib pens i use a M NIB Sheaffer (Targa and 300) beside a P45 with a F Nib the Parker last more than the Sheaffers like if the Sheaffer last a week the Parker last a week and a half or more a 60 ml bottle of ink might last a year or so i terms of my use.

Edited April 22, 2014 by h.farmawi

[KBeezie]

I couldn't tell you an exact number (primarily because I have so many pens inked), but other than an eye-dropper (ie: a pen designed to be filled by the barrel without any cartridges or converters or pistons or such, mainly you fill it up with an eye dropper), most I've seen are usually around 0.5 to 1.1 millimeters (including the ink that may be held in the feed, if you used a converter to take up the ink).

 

My Montblanc 225 is a piston filler, and including the feed I measured it taking up roughly 1.3-1.4 millimeters of ink which is pretty huge in my opinion, and since the nib is somewhat of an 'extra fine' by western standards and is somewhat dry but not lacking flow, it lasts quite a bit (can probably get thur 25-30 pages of notes easily with it). Most of my converter filled ones are usually no more than 0.8-0.9ml, with my Sheaffer Snorkel Admiral being probably around 0.5 (my Touchdown Admiral [fat], probably does closer to 0.7).

 

Now if I did the same thing with a wet 1.5mm stub nib, that ink would be gone by the end of the week out of a converter.

 

PS: Some of the cheaper pens like the Jinhao (Chinese) pens will actually lose ink just sitting around if you don't use them much. Had a Baoer 507 (8 Horse Design), completely dry up in it's converter after about 2 or 3 weeks just not touching it. Which also means they're probably going to be hard to 'start up' when sitting still overnight. So it is possible for ink to evaporate in some pens depending on the design (something that won't likely happen as quickly in my montblanc or monteverde, nor does it seem to do so in my Snorkel which I rarely seem to use now days).

 

So with that in mind, considering that you may consume 1ml of ink filling up (and whatever you wipe away etc), in a 90ml bottle of noodler's ink (I use Noodler's black Eel in a $12 90ml bottle, which seems to be lasting me like forever), you figure you can probably get 80-85 fills of a pen, and if you're using an EF/F nib (if by Japanese size standards, may last even longer), probably won't need to refill until a week or two later if you're constantly writing. (though my Sheaffer Craftsman is a 'extra fine' line, it's also pretty wet, so that dried up pretty fast).

[KBeezie]

I'm a neurotic med student and I use about ~1ml of ink a day. I primarily buy 80ml bottles of Diamine ink. Even burning through ink a bottle still lasts me forever.

Hardcore... What pen and nib size?

[discopig]

Using 1ml a day is very possible with a larger nib and if you write for hours.

[KBeezie]

I find that I can run on one fill of ink for the whole week (and often longer).

Admittedly, I'm using a TWSBI 580 EF and they do hold a lot...plus its an EF so less ink.

I'm really not sure how much it holds but I'd say about 2ml?

 

I haven't even gone through one bottle yet and I've been taking notes with FPs for about a year or so.

 

Sounds about right, the 540 had a capacity of 1.5ml, and the 580 was 30% more (unless I'm thinking 530 -> 580), the VAC700 is supposed to hold even more.

 

Edit: Vac700 is 2.1ml, so the 580 around 1.7-8 maybe?

Using 1ml a day is very possible with a larger nib and if you write for hours.

Hence my curiosity of pen and nib size.

Edited April 22, 2014 by KBeezie

[shawndp]

I can't figure the exact ink consumption down to the mL because I usually have several inks and don't write as much at work as one would at school - but I have a friend who uses only one type of ink and she hasn't finished a bottle of Private Reserve over the school year so far (this being exam week) - I think she is running a Lamy Al-Star fine and a Pilot Metro. Either way as a cost if you budget for 2 bottles of PR or a single of Noodler 90mL you will be under $15 and have ink to spare for summer school... the cost killer is inking up a bunch of pens and writing occasionally.

[casualmerlinconstant]

Hardcore... What pen and nib size?

He takes copious notes about all the terrible things that can happen to the human body. Apparently there's a lot

[KBeezie]

He takes copious notes about all the terrible things that can happen to the human body. Apparently there's a lot

probably knows every way a fountain pen can be used to torture or kill a person. (Nakaya nibs under the nails...)

[casualmerlinconstant]

probably knows every way a fountain pen can be used to torture or kill a person. (Nakaya nibs under the nails...)

what a waste of a fountain pen. especially a Nakaya

[KBeezie]

what a waste of a fountain pen. especially a Nakaya

That's part of the torture...

[Blue_Moon]

I concur with the others. It depends on the size of the nib. Even so, one bottle of ink should last a long (long long) time. Many have bottles of ink years old.

[ndw76]

I have a bottle of Swan ink that used to be my Nana's. She died back in 1999, but I think that company went out of business back in the 1960. The ink still writes beautifully.

 

So if you don't use all your ink in one year there is always the next year, and the next and the next. By that time you will be into full flex pens and will go through ink like you are drinking it.

[Ink Stained Wretch]

Basically, ink lasts for quite a while if you treat it right, e.g. not leaving the cap off or loose, not spilling much and not using a brush to slather it onto the page. There are people gleefullly using 70 year old ink.

 

For someone in primary school I think that one bottle of ink, probably a washable blue for that age range, will usually last at least a year.

 

I've been out of primary school for a little while, so I don't recall exactly what my ink usage rate was back then, but I'm sure that I used very little. That has probably not changed for the current primary schoolers.