Set Of 5 Camlin 22 With Arun Calligraphy Nibs

March 27, 2017

Disclaimer, this is a slightly negatively biased review based on my misinformed expectations. These are my first: eye droppers, indian pens, ebonite feeds and commercial sharp italic nibs so I do not have a good frame of reference to compare the pens. Others might review these pens more favorably.

I received this set of 5 Camlin 22 pens for about $10.50 shipped from India. Since I did not have any pens with many of the features in this set I could not resist making the transaction. The shipping was relatively fast, just under 2 weeks, compared to most deliveries from China. I even had to sign the package which was unusual especially considering the cost.

It came well wrapped in a transparent plastic box, each one wrapped with its own plastic pocket and all of them in bible wrap, so they were well protected during transport. The box is not fancy but has some nice Indian writing on it so I will keep these pens in that box. It came with a very low quality eye dropper to fill the pens, but it does the trick. I just wish it would clean more easily.

The first impression I got when I opened the box was the smell. A very string chemical smell that is hard for me to identify. It is much better after a few weeks but it is still present. The second thing I noticed is that I assumed, incorrectly that the pens were new, but they are not. That’s my fault for not reading the posting more closely. Then I noticed that this are obliques, left obliques as in short to the left and long to the right side of the nib. Also my fault for not reading more closely. Lesson learned, I’ll know to be more careful in my future pen purchases. This is still only $2 a pen for pens that go for $12 + shipping from US retailers, and nibs can be changed. For now I’ll use the pens as vertical italics or in reverse.

Specs:

filling: eye dropper

ink capacity: about 3mL (I don’t have accurate enough equipment to measure 0,1 mL)

weight: 8g, 15g posted add 3g when full

pen alone: 115mm with a 11.5 mm diameter

posted: 151 mm

cap: 64mm with a 13.5mm diameter at the metal band

section: 14mm and a diameter of 0.5mm

ink window: 20mm long, 30mm if you count the threads area over the section

The pens are nice to hold, although I have large hands and prefer oversize pens. They are light at only 18g when capped and full, and you still feel like you are holding something in your hand.

The material on the pen is light plastic that feels soft and almost tacky. It is soft enough that you can put a dent in the plastic with your fingernails if you press hard enough. The only metal parts are the nibs, the two finial rings, the clip and a large metal band on the cap. Each and every plastic part is very roughly and inconsistently finished. I was actually surprised that the pens did not leak, well except the blue one, the soft plastic is probably helping with keeping a good seal. The plastic on the green one is the most acceptable, on the others it can be pretty bad with lots of molding defects. The clip is stamped “KOKUYO CAMLIN”, as Kokuyo acquired Camlin a few years ago. The barrel is only imprinted “Camlin 22 REGD.”, newer models also have “Kokyo” printed on the barrel. The print on the clip and on the barrel are printed in opposite direction but they line up when you post the cap. The clips are not straight and just feel cheap. One nice touch is that the section color matches the barrel’s and cap color.

The feeds are ebonite and clearly hand made with variations in the cut between the different pens. It has dual channels for the ink and Camlin engraved on the bottom.

The nibs are not actual Camlin nibs but Arul nibs. And they are probably the biggest disappointment here. This brand does not seem to have a great reputation and my own impressions confirm that. The nibs are stamped ‘Arul’ with the italic size from 0 to 4. There are the letters ‘SV’ or ‘SY’ but under the section so not visible. The nibs are plated with some gold metal, unlikely to be gold, which flakes a lot. The slit cut is a little off center, and sometimes not reaching the breather hole, other times going up to 1mm beyond. My personal understanding is that the breather hole is there not to ‘breathe’ but to prevent the nib to crack further at the end of the cut. It is a mechanical feature not an ink flow feature as often claimed. So these nibs are very sloppily cut and the material is poor. I had to align the tines on all the nibs, and the #3 nib would not write our to a baby’s bottom issue but easily fixed with a grinding stone. They have some bend in them but nothing I would call flex, and it is meaningless on the larger nibs anyways.

The nib sizes are:

black: #0, 0.7 mm
blue: #1, 0.9 mm
green: #2, 1.2 mm
red: #3, 1.8 mm
grey: #4, 2.8 mm

Inks are:

Thornton's Black (bottle)
Thornton's Blue (bottle)
Private Reserve Sherwood Green
Winsor & Newton Yellow Ochre (do not put this in a fountain pen, even if the bottle claims it is for fountain pens it is for dip pens only)
Thornton's Purple (bottle)

Using the pens was not a pleasure. First the section is very short with only 14mm so I have to hold the pens on the threads and over the ink window. The threads are small and since they are made of the soft plastic, quite comfortable, but I’m concerned about warming up the reservoir faster and causing more burping issues. Which leads me to the primary problem with the pens: burping. I was able to improve that by resetting the feeds with the help of near boiling water but the blue pen was still pretty much unusable until I smoothed the end of the barrel to get a better seal. I've also noticed that opening the barrel to let the pressure equalize helps. The nibs suffered a lot from hard starts and since they are sharp italics they catch the paper fibers between the tines, requiring frequent cleaning. The #3 nib is especially hard to start due to baby's bottom. The ink flow is pretty wet with the large ink channels carved in the ebonite feeds.

The seemingly poor craftsmanship on these pens initially made me think I had fake Camlin pens, but after comparing them with pictures from trusted US retailer and other reviews I believe I have the real deal. It has given me a renewed respect for my JinHao and Baoer pens. Even my cheap Hero 616 has much better finish. I can probably 'polish' the pens to remove most of the flash defects from molding but since the pens will hold standard #5 nibs I will very likely replace them with custom ground italic stubs. I put a JinHao #5 nib in the blue pen and I went from the initial "I hate this pen" to "I would not mind using this pen".

Edited March 27, 2017 by sodul

March 27, 2017

Thank you for the review, too bad about the complications!

March 29, 2017

Thank you your candid evaluation of the pens. I definitely would not spend any money on these myself.

Have you checked out the Pilot Parallel pens? I just got a great price for all four of them (1.5 - 6.0 mm) from Goldspot (no affiliation). I'm quite happy with the pens and especially the service (thanks Todd). I know the Pilots are more expensive than the Camlin and don't look like regular FPs and they are much better at doing Italic calligraphy or "straight edge" writing.

Please continue passing on your learning experience.

March 29, 2017

I do not do calligraphy, yet, so I do not have a strong need for the Pilot Parallel pens. I have a vintage French Waterman that my grandfather purchased in the 40s or 50s that I believe to be an eye dropper. It is in great shape but so far I have not really been able to use it and will use the Camlin pens to experiment with solving issues. I do believe the Camlin 22 can be a good writing pen with a proper nib and a bit of TLC, as I don't believe FPR would sell it for $12 if they thought otherwise.

January 19, 2020

While rummaging through my pen supplies I decided to clean up these pens that I had left to dry with ink for over 2 so I let the pens soak in water overnight to clean them.

Since I'm much more experienced with pens, including left obliques, and I have more supplies I decided to try the pens, or at least one, again.

I cleaned the black pen with the 0.7mm left oblique then took time to deburr the body so as to have a much better contact with the section but I also added a 9mm rubber ring and some silicon grease.

Well this is much better. The nib no longer has a runny nose and the pen is definitely useable. The flow is not perfect but I probably need to deep clean the feed since it was left with ink to dry for a long time. I might take the time to smooth the nib and see if it can be improved.

The cap posts securely but really need to be pushed in the back. As an eye dropper it is probably better to use it posted anyhow as an added insulation layer to avoid burping.

I still think that these ~~Arun~~ Arul nibs are mostly low quality steel with low quality plating and they will not last a lifetime as they show signs of corrosion.

Edited January 19, 2020 by sodul

January 19, 2020

The nibs are ARUL actually. In Tamil, arul means grace.

January 20, 2020

The nibs are ARUL actually. In Tamil, arul means grace.

Thanks for the correction, spellchecker automatically changed it to Arun, somehow.

January 22, 2020

I have these pens with the original nibs and I think they work fine for what they are. Camlin 22's are just a step or two above their school type of pens. With a bit of attention, they write OK and they hold a couple of mls. of ink. They are not going to be like a 12 dollar Chinese pen because they are Indian through and through. I do not do calligraphy so I can't be a judge on that but I do know that you really don't want to mess with used, cheap Indian nibs. While many are just as good today as the day they were made, there are also a lot that leave much to be desired. It's like that everywhere with everything we seem to desire. I hope you can find a way to make these work to your satisfaction.