My New Preciousss: Sailor Cross Concord

August 23, 2014

Hello FPN!!

I always liked fountain pens; for years I have only written with one. But it was only about a year or two ago I REALLY got the fountain pen fever. As in buying pens that cost as much as a regular day of work, and having no place to put them, and walking around everyday carrying 4 or five of them. lately, my EDC has about 15 pens...

But, I digress. So, I wanted to talk about this amazing pen I just got in the mail a couple a days ago. I always read a lot of good things about Sailor, and was really interested in trying one of their specialty nibs, but they were so expensive!! So, one day, browsing ebay I found this seller, Bombare, announcing a auction with the sexiest of the specialty nibs, and made a bid of less than half the retail value for this pen.

Needless to say I spent days hardly sleeping, obsessively checking ebay to see if some @@%##$#$# had outbid me...!! then WOW!!! I won it!!! I could hardly believe it!!! Finnally I would own one of those magic nibs!!

About one month later ( yep, customs in Brazil can take an incredible amount of time to release items... making my life a lot harder!!) I received a nicely package from Japan, with this outstanding pen!!

Now, to the review!

First impressions:

The box is a lot bigger than regular sailor boxes, and more luxurious. Inside the cardboard box there was another box in a kind of velvet lining, nice.

Opening it there was a nice Sailor logo, a converter, two cartdriges a booklet and a nice letter in japanese, probably saying "Thank you for buying our pen, we hope you like blablabla"

And the pen.

Montblanc??

Nope, but pretty close. it seems Sailor has a bit of a thing for MB...

Appearance and design: 9-10

The pen is very beautiful, solid, quality plastic. My wife dropped it uncapped about one hour after I got it ( almost led me to a divorce...) and I could see no damage. Impressive. Three gold bands. nice clip, the big band says "Sailor Japan founded 1911". Very atractive, but nothing exactly new. High quality though, You can feel it.

Filling system: 7-10

Sailor proprietary converter. Nice, works well, eazy to clean. But it takes a minuscule amount of ink.

Nib : 10-10

This is where Sailor truly shines. My friends, this is the SEXIEST nib I have ever seen. Look at these lines, this pronouced beak, the crisp inprints... I fell in love with it at first sight. It´s actually two nibs fused together, one on top of each other, and the tip has a interesting design, reminds me of a eagle beak. And the tip also has a cross shaped slit, to increase inkflow.

But the nib is only as good as how it writes, rigth??

And how does this baby rolls??
In one word: delicious.

The downside writes a japanese fine, quite smooth, some feedback, but very pleasant. No flex, as per the design of the nib.

When writing upside-down is where this baby shines: it writes a luxurious, thick, brush-like line. Butter smooth, glides across the paper. It´s very pleasant. So much so that I like to just doodle with it.

It´s kind of an accountant nib, where the downstrokes are thinner than side strokes. Lovely shading too. Never has this baby skipped on me either.

Cost and value.8-10

Aye, that´s the rub. It usually retails for 535 ( nibs.com ) wich is quite expensive for a pen, no matter how you look at it. It does deliver an outstanding experience, but it´s a bit steep. I could never bring myself to pay full price. BUT, as I said in the beginning, I payed half price for it, and I think it´s truly a bargain. Even for full price I would buy it if it wasn´t for the insane amout of taxes and headache I would have here.

Conclusion: 34-40

I really love this pen, can you tell??

Lovely body, very sturdy ( as my wife proved it...) and the sexiest, juiciest nib in the house. If you like interesting pens, smooth, and with many aplications, grab it. It costs about as much as a Montblanc but I think its so much better.

So, that´s about it. Hope you enjoy it, I welcome any advice.

See ya!!

August 25, 2014

Hmmm... I seem to have missed it, is this a King of Pen ST with gold trim or is this a 1911 Full-size with gold trim? The sizes are different, but they look very similar.

August 25, 2014

You, sir, have just given me even more reason to want this pen! A few custom pens and LEs aside, this has been my grail pen for a while. About the only thing keeping this from the top of my list is the fact that I already have a Sailor pen, one that cost quite a bit as well, and want to try out more brands instead of focusing on one.

Excellent pics, nicely-worded review. Thanks again, thiagojp! By the by, what ink did you use in the review?

Cheers!

Kevin

August 26, 2014

Congratulations! "Cross" my heart - I am jealous! I tried and missed many an auction from this seller on many a pen!

August 27, 2014

Hello Baric, I think it's a 1911 full size.

Thanks Kevin, I'm glad you like it!! This is an extremely interesting pen!! I really like Sailor pens, so I don't think it would be bad to have a bunch of them... Even if they are a bit pricey. The ink is waterman south sea blue, I quite like it, gives a nice shading on wetter pens.

Sridar, so you was one of my competitors for this pen!! Hope you get the next one!! You'll love it!

August 27, 2014

Haha, the number of FPs from other manufactures I have queued for purchase is rather high at the moment, and they're all fairly pricey as well (an Edison Sig line, a vintage pen or two, and *maybe* a Nakaya), so it'll be quite some time before I get a Cross Concord. Not unless someone would be willing to trade for a standard Naginata Togi nib?

Cheers!

Kevin

August 28, 2014

Nice review and glad you enjoyed your pen. I have bought a similar one, but it wasn't the cross concord like yours, it was the Naginata Cross Emperor.http://www.nibs.com/www/WEBSITE%20PICS/Sailor%20Pens/Sailor%20Nibs/Naginata%20Cross%20Emperor.jpg

The honest truth is that the pen had a beautiful finish and felt very sturdily built. I do however, really really HATE the way the nib writes. It was out of control. You simply can't control the amount of ink that comes out when you try to write with the wide side. It remains very inconsistent. I tried turning the nib upside down as it was supposed to be able to write the other way as well and it was so scratchy. What an unreasonably annoying nib.

I suppose this will work if you want to use it to write some kanji or mandrin characters but for regular artsy stuff or writing, it is simply quite horrible. I didn't smoothen out the front side of the nib as I didn't want to risk affecting the juicy part.

I simply sold it off luckily without a loss. The guy who bought it was happy he got a deal but ended up selling it because he felt the nib was just unusable as well.

Actually it was quite a let down, I looked forward to this nib for such a long time and when I finally purchased it, I was so disappointed at it's performance. I am glad you like yours but I am pretty sure you don't use the wide part of the nib very often eh?

Cheers.

Julian

September 1, 2014

Hello Kevin! Wow, that's an impressive wishlist!! I don't have any Nakaya yet, but I just got an Edison Collier and it's outstanding, just sent the first payment for a custom!! Ha, sorry, but my concord is here to stay! I was thinking of buying a naginata, but thats after I recapitalize...

Julian, you are the first I ever heard who hated a sailor nib!! I know the emperor tab is designed to increase inkflow, perhaps overly so... On my pen the inkflow is great, wet enough to be juicy and smooth but not to create bleed or smudges. Really very well ballanced. The fine side is not scratchy, but has more feedback than a regular sailor f nib, it's not uncomfortable to write, but doesn't glide line the broad side. Perhaps you got a lemon?

September 3, 2014

Haha, I'd be quite happier if it were a collection rather than just theoreticals on a wishlist

Still, yeah, I guess I just have a tendency towards pricier things *shakes head*. Man, that's going to be a huge pain down the line. Anyway, congrats on the Edison! The Collier looks like an amazing pen, haha. but not really up my alley. What kind of finish did you get it in? Part of Edison's allure is the insanely wide range of materials they offer their pens in.

Cheers!

Kevin

September 4, 2014

Fantastic pen review! I love your sense of humour: almost leading to a divorce because your honey with the money dropped the cap. Hahaha...

September 4, 2014

On 8/28/2014 at 4:22 AM, mrchan said:
Nice review and glad you enjoyed your pen. I have bought a similar one, but it wasn't the cross concord like yours, it was the Naginata Cross Emperor.http://www.nibs.com/www/WEBSITE%20PICS/Sailor%20Pens/Sailor%20Nibs/Naginata%20Cross%20Emperor.jpg
The honest truth is that the pen had a beautiful finish and felt very sturdily built. I do however, really really HATE the way the nib writes. It was out of control. You simply can't control the amount of ink that comes out when you try to write with the wide side. It remains very inconsistent. I tried turning the nib upside down as it was supposed to be able to write the other way as well and it was so scratchy. What an unreasonably annoying nib.

I suppose this will work if you want to use it to write some kanji or mandrin characters but for regular artsy stuff or writing, it is simply quite horrible. I didn't smoothen out the front side of the nib as I didn't want to risk affecting the juicy part.

I simply sold it off luckily without a loss. The guy who bought it was happy he got a deal but ended up selling it because he felt the nib was just unusable as well.

Actually it was quite a let down, I looked forward to this nib for such a long time and when I finally purchased it, I was so disappointed at it's performance. I am glad you like yours but I am pretty sure you don't use the wide part of the nib very often eh?

Cheers.
Julian

I have the same nib on a Sailor profit and love it. What's wrong with me?

October 29, 2015

This is the next pen I want to buy - but in the professional gear barrel. I used to like the King Eagle better but since realize this one is much more practical for daily writing. The King Eagle is for show and calligraphy.