J Herbin’S Rouge Hematite Looks To Be In Good Shape

[S-K]

J HERBIN’s ROUGE HEMATITE LOOKS TO BE IN GOOD SHAPE

 

Does an ink having more saturation than usual can have good flow properties in a pen?

Can an ink having good flow properties in a pen can show no feathering/ bleeding tendencies on paper?

Both anwers can be “ Yes” if you are using J Herbin’s Rouge Hematite .

J Herbin’s 1670 Rouge Hematite, Anniversary Edition. So what’s about it?

 

 

 

CLAIMS

This is what J Herbin claims – “ To celebrate the 340^th Anniversary of the brand, we are introducing the “ 1670” ink especially formulated for this event.

With a dark red color and earthy tone,it is a reminder of the historic color of the Herbin logo and the sealing wax by the members of royal courts.This rich deepdye will bring brightness and majesty to all your writing”.

Probably calling this as just another FP ink may be under estimating it. So here the review goes…

 

 

BOTTLE, COVER

 

 

The cover shows earthy red and golden colors, an indication of what this ink is going to deliver.

 

 

 

Bottle design - So radical, so classy…. An any day head turner.

 

 

Bottle, Opened…The cap is made of combination of Aluminium and Rubber, have a nice feel in hand.

 

 

 

Get past the appearance of the bottle to reveal the flaw – Bye Big pens..!

 

 

 

COLOR

The ink writes on paper with a bright red color and then dries to an earthy tone as the booklet describes. An impressive bright red with an earthy tone.

Swab. See the golden tinge. This is the most peculiar feature of this ink.

 

 

Swab color analysis of area with out golden tinge - shows Reddish brown on brighter side.

 

 

Swab analysis of area with golden tinge- shows more Yellow still on very bright side.

 

 

It’s strange that chromatography do not reveal any Yellow or Brown tone. It simply shows Red and Pink components. I believe the golden tone appears where the ink is dried with out much absorption. Where there is more absorption like a swab, the gold tinge can not appear. This is more in line with the property of the dye used rather than any suspended particles, but I am not sure.

 

 

 

COLOR ON PAPER

BRIGHT..

 

 

STRONG…

 

 

AND CHEERFUL..!

 

 

Yes, a bright, saturated and happy color.

 

 

 

 

With a Fine nib.

 

 

 

[

With Medium nib.

 

 

Passes.

 

 

 

PROPERTIES IN PEN

Testing materials include

Camlin Trinity Fine nib Convertor Filled

Lamy Safari Medium Convertor Filled

Wingsung Medium Aerometric Filled

Kim Small Medium stub Eyedropper Filled

 

 

 

Camlin trinity Fine nib writing sample

 

 

Lamy Medium nib writing sample

 

 

 

Kim stub writing sample.

 

 

 

With nib changed to a Broader one.

 

 

 

See the golden tinge more and more appearing with broader ( and more flow) nibs.

Edited October 23, 2014 by S-K

[S-K]

FLOW PROPERTIES

 

Compared to two other well flowing inks which act as a standard. Same pen and nib used, same paper and same conditions. Rouge Hematite runs as good as other well flowing inks. At the same time it is more fun to write due to better lubricating properties of it. Did I tell that Rouge Hematite is having more saturation than any of these?

 

Impression – Rouge Hematite is a well lubricated, well flowing ink.

 

 

WILL IT CLOG PENS?

AN important question. I tested with three pens.

Camlim Trinity Convertor Filled

Lamy Safari Convertor filled

Wingsung Aerometric filled.

Lamy Safari and Wingsung pens were filled with the ink and kept for 2 weeks and Camlin Trinity kept for 1 month. Actually my plan was to keep every thing for one month. See what happened.

 

 

This was the picture when Lamy and Wingsung were kept for one week ( all closed). You can see clogs and dye crumps especially through a microcope. When I tried to write Lamy hiccupped a little before running smooth while Wingsung wrote with out any problem. Camlin not opened yet.

 

 

Kept for one more week.

 

Lamy after 2 weeks. I was not feeling comfortable.Too much clogs. The pen really do not write, but wrote when just wetted with water.

 

 

Wingsung was not showing that much problem. It wrote with out any skipping.

 

Anyway I decided not to continue the experiment on these favourite pens and continued on Camlin only.

 

 

Surprisingly Camlin Trinity after one month shows no clogs. With some initial skipping as shown by blue arrow, it wrote with out any problems.

 

 

So What is the conclusion?

Inconsistent Results. At present there is nothing there to prove that Rouge Hematite can clog a pen. More studies are really needed.

OTHER PROPERTIES

Nib creeps ? Yes ! as you seen from earlier photos. Not a big issue.

Discoloration of pen - Yes, especially in a white Lamy, but can be removed easily.

 

 

 

 

PROPERTIES ON PAPER

This is where the real strength of this ink lies.

Its really really a unique color. Red with golden shading.

Beautiful golden shade.

 

 

 

Use it on cheapest paper with out any problem. No feathering, no bleeding!

 

 

 

On cheap paper ( read cheapest)

 

 

On better paper. Better paper have more golden shading.

 

 

 

Bleeding on cheaper paper

 

 

 

Bleeding on better paper.

 

 

 

DRYING

Here also Rouge Hematite shows excellent results. Dries in an impressive time. Takes around 3-7 seconds only according to the paper used.

 

 

 

 

WATER RESISTANCE

 

Sample just wetted with water

 

 

 

Sample shown under water.

Rouge hematite have no water resistance.

 

 

 

Kudos, chemists of J herbin. You have made the thing stands apart from the crowd and the Anniversary ink live up to the expectations. Cheers!

 

Thanks

Sree

Edited October 23, 2014 by S-K

[visvamitra]

Fantastic review as usual. Thank you

[SujiCorp12345]

Very thorough review. I'm not a big fan of reds, but I think I should try this one out!

[Uncial]

Where did you find the one with gold sheen? I have the latest batch and there is no gold present whatsoever, which was a big let down.

[S-K]

Bought from Pen's Avenue, India. But this may be one of it's earlier batches

as I have bought it as soon as it was released.

Sree

[Davis19942003]

I wanted a purple ink before, and then I read this review..............
Well, I have to save up budgets anyway.

 

 

Edit to add: Thank you for the nice review.

Edited October 23, 2014 by Davis19942003

[Morphling27]

  On 10/23/2014 at 11:16 AM, Uncial said:

Where did you find the one with gold sheen? I have the latest batch and there is no gold present whatsoever, which was a big let down.

Did you shake it? As far as I can tell from historical things on this forum and other sources, there are 3 versions of the ink. The original had A LOT of gold in it, as particles as best can be described. They remade it without any gold just having it the deep, earthy red you see overall and the chromatography reveals to be just red/pink. It was then remade, into what I"m pretty sure is the current version, with some gold in it, but not as much or a different kind than originally.

 

I have to shake mine a lot to get the sediement off the bottom. This is what leads me to believe it is NOT a dye to the ink but rather a particle added to it. Hence why it wouldn't show up in any chromatography that's done on the ink.

 

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

[S-K]

Hi,

My bottle does not show sediments at bottom. Probably the second one you describe.

But I am not sure about versions

Sree