Franklin Christoph - Masuyama Nib Experience?

[WayTooManyHobbies]

I recently won an Ebay auction for a F-C Model 27 Diamondline - really a beautiful pen. One selling point was the advertised custom nib by Michael Masuyama, said to be a medium cursive italic.

 

The pen arrived well-packaged and in excellent shape, and under magnification the nib shows evidence of grinding. However it seems both a bit dry and somewhat rough, not at all what I was expecting. I've tried several different angles of pen to paper, with only minor affects.

 

I'm normally an EF-F writer, so this is really a first foray for me. Should this nib be a bit scratchy?

[apenpusher]

I have the 27 with the MM gold cursive stub. I hated it at first; it skipped, railroaded and was a very dry scratchy writer. Then after several fills and flushes it suddenly kicked into life. Now it's soft and springy, with nice variation, and has a good ink flow, and is one of my favourote nibs.

[Blue_Moon]

If you can't get it to write well, notify F-C. Their customer service is absolutely the best! They will do what it takes to make you happy.

[Vikhalla]

I just received a Model 27 with the same nib this week. https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/index.php/topic/267136-review-franklin-christoph-model-27-with-hpsteel-m-italic-musuyama-nib/

 

 

The writing experience thus far has been a very mixed bag. This is the medium-italic, Musuyama ground HPSteel nib. I opened the package, flushed the nib, and inked up with Private Reserve Black Cherry. I went to town on my daily entry in the Clairefontaine journal that I carry. It was GLASS SMOOTH and wonderful...for about half of a page. Then it started to skip and it was very difficult to get started. I tried a different ink (Waterman Harmonious Green) and a new nib flush - no luck. I flushed again and switched to one of the cartridges that came with it, "Maybe their own ink will work!" That's when I noticed that the nib was kind of lopsided on the feed. Having never modified a pen before, I clenched my teeth and nudged the nib over the feed evenly. Things got better immediately.

I still have an issue with hard-starting - bad enough that I'm considering trying out the customer service. However, I also have ready that CI nibs can be temperamental in regard to writing angle and I am getting better, but still...I want to be sure. Either way, the smoothness that I had in the start is back and the nib really makes my handwriting pop with the line variation. Because, hard starts aside, it writes so well I'm really just going to give it the benefit of the doubt. It really does look and write great when it gets going.

Edited May 23, 2014 by Vikhalla

[Newjelan]

I have the 27 with the MM gold cursive stub. I hated it at first; it skipped, railroaded and was a very dry scratchy writer. Then after several fills and flushes it suddenly kicked into life. Now it's soft and springy, with nice variation, and has a good ink flow, and is one of my favourote nibs.

I had the same experience with mine too, and glad I persevered.