Aurora 14K Gold Extra Fine Nib Versus...

[A Smug Dill]

I have one Aurora, an Ipsilon that was gifted to me. The nib in that is on par with the steel Japanese nibs in my stable. I'd love to hear how you find yours, and how they compare with finer Japanese pens if you got a better Aurora than an Ipsilon

 

The Aurora 14K gold EF nib I have writes very smoothly but not completely (or intolerably) devoid of feedback. It gave the least audible and tactile feedback of all the pens/nibs in the list below, although the difference between it and my Sailor Pro Gear in that regard is nigh negligible. On the other hand, in spite of being an EF nib, it writes more broadly than any of the Japanese gold F nibs I tested just then. Even the 18K gold Pilot Capless F nib (of which the output is not shown below) leaves a finer line than the Aurora.

 

My Diplomat and Rotring steel EF nibs also write more finely than it does. (I'm not sure about the Lamy and Faber-Castell steel EF nibs.)

 

I can live with its line width as is, but I'm damn glad I didn't order the Aurora F nib instead.

 

Edited December 29, 2018 by A Smug Dill

[Bo Bo Olson]

Japanese is one width narrower than Euro. Pilot is the skinner Japanese nib. Sailor the fat one.

Aurora is the skinniest Euro nib....so can be with in half a width of a fat Sailor nib. Or so I read.

 

Your Rotering at least is semi-vintage and Diplomat could be, so would be narrower than modern. Semi-vintage and Vintage German pens use to be a 1/2 a width narrower than modern.....outside the Pelikan 200's nib.

 

The inks are you using....that can make a difference of a width.....Japanese inks are wet.

I have no idea how wet each of your Diamine inks are.....or if they are dry. So by using different ink, does no real comparison, with the same nib width.

Got to use the same ink, same paper.

 

 

IMO, gold vs steel has no difference in width ......different company, different days/the next same width pen on the line, different widths with in tolerance.

Nail is nail if gold or steel, in my experience not difference, even if 18 K nail. Soft gold nail....would be a different flex.....semi-nail, instead of nail.

Semi-nail would be the same too, be it steel which I luckily don't think I have. I do have a P-75 and a 605 gold semi-nail.

But in regular flex and semi-flex I see no difference between gold and steel.

A good steel and a good gold nib........in I sometimes wonder if folks mix up cheaply made steel nibs with good made, gold nibs.

Edited December 31, 2018 by Bo Bo Olson

[bass1193]

The Aurora 14K gold EF nib I have writes very smoothly but not completely (or intolerably) devoid of feedback. It gave the least audible and tactile feedback of all the pens/nibs in the list below, although the difference between it and my Sailor Pro Gear in that regard is nigh negligible. On the other hand, in spite of being an EF nib, it writes more broadly than any of the Japanese gold F nibs I tested just then. Even the 18K gold Pilot Capless F nib (of which the output is not shown below) leaves a finer line than the Aurora.

 

My Diplomat and Rotring steel EF nibs also write more finely than it does. (I'm not sure about the Lamy and Faber-Castell steel EF nibs.)

 

I can live with its line width as is, but I'm damn glad I didn't order the Aurora F nib instead.

 

I really appreciate this! I suspected that they might have similar feedback to Sailor nibs. I also prefer Japanese ef for everyday writing, but thanks to you I now know that an Aurora gold ef is a worthy nib to hunt!

[Bo Bo Olson]

XXF Euro would do too to match Japanese EF....If one could find such needle nibs there.

Edited December 31, 2018 by Bo Bo Olson

[A Smug Dill]

Japanese is one width narrower than Euro. Pilot is the skinner Japanese nib. Sailor the fat one.

Not with F nibs, in my experience, but then I only have used one Sailor with a 21K gold H-F nib. (I do have another, as yet unopened, Sailor Pro Gear Realo that also has a 21K gold H-F nib.) I have plenty of Pilot pens with gold F nibs, EF nibs, SF nibs, etc. and I wouldn't say they write finer than Sailor nibs categorically.

 

The 14K gold MF nibs on the two Sailor koshu-inden pens I have don't leave broader lines than my Aurora 14K gold EF nib, by my recollection. (I can't be bothered testing and comparing them right now, sorry.)

 

Aurora is the skinniest Euro nib....so can be with in half a width of a fat Sailor nib. Or so I read.

I read that Aurora nibs are among the narrowest European nibs for the width grade, but in my sample space of one, it does not appear to be the case.

 

Your Rotering at least is semi-vintage and Diplomat could be, so would be narrower than modern.

The Rotring 400 can hardly be considered semi-vintage, and I only just bought my Diplomat Aero from LCdC in November.

 

The inks are you using....that can make a difference of a width.....

That is very true.

 

Japanese inks are wet.

That's far too broad a sweeping statement. In my experience, for example, Sailor seiboku and souboku are not wet.

 

I have no idea how wet each of your Diamine inks are.....or if they are dry. So by using different ink, does no real comparison, with the same nib width.

Got to use the same ink, same paper.

For a scientific comparison, sure, you'd want to keep all other variables as consistent between trials as possible.

 

It isn't necessary to do so to form an opinion of something, however, and bass1193 was asking my opinion and first-hand user experience.

 

<EDIT>

I just wrote with my two Sailor koshu-inden pens, both fitted with 14K gold H-MF nibs and inked with Sailor Shikiori inks (rikyucha and okuyama, respectively). I'd say one writes like a Japanese F nib (or even EF nib) , and the other writes with lines that are still a hair finer than the Aurora 14K gold EF nib I have.

Edited December 31, 2018 by A Smug Dill

[Bo Bo Olson]

A fine Japanese poster brought up Sailor being fatter than Pilot....so took his word. (He also brought up that the marking on ball point sticks are not precise. Which seemed a shock....but no one called him on it so could well be true. He was taking a poke at the people complaining about tolerance in fountain pens. Ballpoint, gel, hybrid re-fills have tolerance also. )

 

In I find Euro F to be fine for me, and only have a few Euro EF pens....two regular flex.and one maxi-semi-flex. The two in regular flex for editing, the maxi, is seldom used...in it is easy to write in F with it, which takes it out of the editing class.

 

Some folks come in on M, and go skinny, I went wide. So even buying F was just buying place markers for the longest time.....well it seemed long at the time, before I became use to F and started using F more.

Oddly, I've grown fond of M nibs.

 

In Germany, I'm not going to spend E22 on a Japanese ink, down from E70 of two-three years ago before Amazon took over that part of the ink market. (Not going to buy any more E19 MB ink either. )

Had read Pelikan was high viscosity..dry, and Sailor was lower viscosity....wet.

 

I had wondered slightly about some Japanese inks shading.....well Noodlers is often wet, but does have inks that shade. Both Noodlers and Japanese are expensive here in Europe so I'm not interested enough to make a list of wet and dry inks from either.

Same goes for Diamine. I have enough trouble trying to get my 100 mainland Euro inks. There are still three or four companies i don't have inks from; make that five, in two are 'new', One in Paris from some 5 years ago, the Polish one is @ two years old I think. I don't have any of their inks.

Monteverdi, has come out of nowhere with real good inks.....and I don't have even one. Visconti Blue is missing. And has been for 9 years.

That's what happens when one buys pens.....the inks limp behind.

Paper even more so.

 

My interest in wet, boring monotone inks is nill; be they vivid or not. Have a couple..........want shading, sheen.....sigh even bought some glitter ink.................that I don't reach for.

Edited January 1, 2019 by Bo Bo Olson

[BaronWulfraed]

So far, my experience is that Platinum seems to the "finest" of the three major Japanese makes... But even that has variation... Observe two "President" nibs, one marked B and the other is marked M. Observe the visible difference in the size of the tipping ball. (Apologies for the cut&paste cell-phone camera images)

 

Then observe the sample writing both of these nibs produce (not life size). Especially as seen via a 6X comparator. For all effective purposes, the Broad nib in my 2013 Izumo puts down the same size line as the Medium nib in my 2018 President.

 

http://bieberd.home.netcom.com/Tale-of-2-Nibs.jpg

Edited January 1, 2019 by BaronWulfraed

[Honeybadgers]

I want an aurora OBBB. One day I'll get brave and buy it when it pops on massdrop.

[Bo Bo Olson]

My experience with a vintage OBBB Pelikan 500 and a BBBB Manuscript.....is they are too wide....even when vintage 1/2 a width narrower is............they are too large.

The Pelikan takes up 2/3rds to 3/4ths a page for a legal two name and middle initial. The BBBB is good only for drawing a heading.

 

I think vintage....BB or OBB is about as far as one can go and actually write. I do have some....A Vac and Snorkel in BB, and some OBB Osmia....and some other forgotten (for now) pen.

 

Vintage OB is like a modern M-B nib....a writing nib....not a signature nib.

Do have a 1005 OBB that is a half a size wider than my semi-vintage pre'97 600's OBB. That does make a difference in writing.

[TheDutchGuy]

I tried two Ipsilons this week when I visited a pen store in Amsterdam that carries them, one with F steel nib and one with F 14k nib. I liked the steel nib better. In fact, it was one of the best steel nibs I've ever had the pleasure of using. The 14k nib was a lot wetter, wrote a line nearly twice as wide and didn't really feel better. The only reason I didn't buy the steel nabbed version was because of its drab matte black looks; the 14k version came in a wonderful Italian-red (think Ferrari-red) but the store either couldn't or wouldn't swap the nibs for me.

 

I also had a look at the more expensive Aurora models but I couldn't shake the feeling that they're overpriced. That steel-nibbed Ipsolin is an itch I'll have to scratch sometime.

[Bo Bo Olson]

All brand name pens are over priced.....look in the used market.

Look in the Com's sale section.

[A Smug Dill]

Just received my order from Endless Pens that included an Aurora 88 Sigaro Blu with EF nib, which I haven't inked yet. It's a nice enough pen, but I'm of two minds right now about returning it even though, yes, I can spare $600 for something I feel lukewarm about owning. (PayPal will cover the return postage if it came to that.) I wish the Leonardo Momento Zero was already here for me to compare, but alas of course it isn't. Yes, it sports an 18K gold nib, but wouldn't I prefer two Leonardo Furore pens and a Namiki Falcon with EF nib and rhodium trim for the price? (Actually, I'm not so sure about the Namiki Falcon either, and of course the Leonard Furore are sight unseen to me at this tage.)

[TheDutchGuy]

Tough choices, Smug Dill.

 

You'll find the Leonardo pens to be well-made, with a certain old-school charm. The Furore is almost the same size and shape as a MB 146, but with a different-shaped section. And the Momento Zero is like a blunt-ended Furore.. So if you like the feel of a MB 146 then you'll probably like the feel of the Leonardos. Personally I slightly prefer the no-step-down section of the 146 but both Leonardos fit my hand very well and allow for effortless long sessions.

 

Writing wise, no other pen that I currently own equals my steel Leonardo F nibs, neither vintage nor new. Close contenders would be a 50s Sheaffer PFM-III (rigid but heavenly), a new Visconti HS Lava Steel Midi (bouncy, lovely) and a 50s MB 342 F semi-flex. The feedback of the Leonardo F nibs resembles that of a really smooth Sailor M nib: velvety and pencil-like, without the tooth that I associate with narrower Sailor nibs. As I said before, the Leonardo EF nib struck me as slightly toothier and less pencil-like, but it wrote a lot more narrow than the F. And you really need to like feathery, bouncy nibs. It's totally different from writing with a rigid nib.

 

This is all highly personal and subjective, though. To me, the F nibs in my Leonardos are the summit and I really couldn't care less that they're "cheapo 18 euro steel nibs insourced from whatever bulk manufacturer."Also the way these pens bring out the best in my inks, I adore that. My MZ makes Sailor Blue sheen and shade like nothing else, it really is a wonderful fountain pen experience. But someone else might use my pen and be left scratching his head and wondering what on Earth the fuss is all about.

Edited January 10, 2019 by TheDutchGuy

[Bo Bo Olson]

Aurora always had a reputation for toothy nibs. (From my reading Sailor seems to have that rep too.)

 

I tested a $$$ Aurora Verdi (not the solid gold one...but one that had cost E1,000 in it cost E750 on sale,)a very, very handsome pen at my B&M when I bought my Woolf. It was still in the era when Aurora made semi-flex nibs.** It was too toothy for me. I'd brought a Geha 725 to the B&M to test as a semi-flex. Didn't buy a Pen of Their Time by Pelikan either....did dither about three expensive pens. Wife was buying me a birthday present. Took a quick look at Verdies, don't see that one, but it reminded me more of a Toledo, then the 5 or so I just saw.............not going to worry about it.

I cheeped out and bought the MB Virginia Woolf for E450.

Had I never used it, I could have sold it later for the original E750.....but why have a pen but to use it?

 

Forgot to remember the small print............our money............couldn't buy a pen, ink nor paper for some nine months afterwards.

 

**There was a time when Aurora made semi-flex pens long, long after all others had stopped....to at least 2005 or there abouts. From time of that Verdi.

 

When the new Aurora "Flex" pen came in....I'd hopes they'd come back to semi-flex.....having the skill, knowledge of alloy mix, and old workers they could un-retire to train the younger. Unfortunately from what I read it's not even semi-flex ................don't know what it it.......outside of a waste of money.

[ItsMeDave]

Aurora always had a reputation for toothy nibs. (From my reading Sailor seems to have that rep too.)

 

It's the toothy-ness of Aurora and Sailor nibs that draw me to these brands. I need a bit of resistance on the page, I have a hard time writing with really smooth nibs.

[A Smug Dill]

Aurora always had a reputation for toothy nibs. (From my reading Sailor seems to have that rep too.)

Reputation does not always reflect reality. The EF nib on my Aurora Alpha writes very smoothly, compared to most of the fountain pens in my 150-strong collection.

 

Toothy? Try the Platinum President F nib on my Izumo akatame.

 

I need a bit of resistance on the page, I have a hard time writing with really smooth nibs.

Absolutely.

Edited January 10, 2019 by A Smug Dill

[Bo Bo Olson]

I'm sure Aurora's reputation for toothy came from it's semi-flex decades. With out semi-flex one does have to fiddle with the nib to make it go.

 

There is butter smooth, which I have a few such pens. (Beats the hell out of an old fashioned pre gel ball point......beats gel/hybred pens too.) Good on poor paper.....and many refuse to buy good paper.

 

Most of my pens are old vintage pens, with the drag of sitting for generations in the dark of the drawer, smoothed just enough away to be good and smooth, the level just under butter smooth. (Smoohting to butter smooth is so much work!!!) Will not sail off of slick paper..........a touch of feel.

I've new Pelikan 200's that are very good and smooth....still under butter smooth of modern 400/600/800 and 1000's fat and blobby nibs.

 

Toothy is like writing with a pencil.....some folks who know toothy, will say which pencil lead, #1, #2 or a #3, their toothy pen writes too, or which pencil it should be like. That is lots more than where I'd go, but I only have a couple toothy pens. I kept them so, in one needs at least one.

 

Where is the micro-mesh....my pen is toothy..................what about where is a wet lubricated ink, in some day one might want a toothy pen....................this is fountain pens, where weird is normal.

 

I'm a grumpy old man, don't want all my fountain pens to write with the exact same 8/10 on the scale of wetness; that many wish.

Such limits what ink or paper one may use....16 pens that write 8/10, one dull mono-tone ink, one poor paper.

Edited January 11, 2019 by Bo Bo Olson

[A Smug Dill]

Well, I decided to keep the Aurora 88 Sigaro Blu, and inked it up last night. Actually, I really enjoy writing with it! Its 18K gold EF nib is marginally finer than the 14K gold EF nib on my Aurora Alpha.

 

My Leonardo Momento Zero in Hawaii resin and fitted with steel EF nib arrived today. With that, I didn't wait, but flushed it and then inked it up immediately. Sadly, I'm not really quite as taken with the writing experience using that EF nib.

[A Smug Dill]

Another Aurora – an Optima 365 2018 LE 'Cappuccino' pen – with an 18K gold EF nib arrived last week.

 

 

It seems to be the finest out of the three Aurora gold EF nibs I have, but then the 'wetness' or 'dryness' of the ink may have some impact on it. In any case, this one I'll happily accept is a proper Extra Fine nib.

[Aimee]

*Deleted

Edited May 12, 2019 by -NA